


The Other Side of Paradise

by GingersSailboat



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Music, Anal Sex, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon character death (Han Solo - mentioned only), Car Accidents, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Manipulation, Mental Breakdown, Musician/Manager relationship, Musicians, Oral Sex, Recreational Drug Use, Rock and Roll, colleagues to friends to lovers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-03
Updated: 2019-12-04
Packaged: 2020-10-06 16:09:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20509787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GingersSailboat/pseuds/GingersSailboat
Summary: Kylo Ren is world-famous, a musician at the top of his game with sold-out shows and platinum albums whose influence has surpassed even that of his late father Han Solo, lead singer of beloved rock band The Resistance. With a reputation that paints him as wild and unpredictable, he is about to embark on an intensive three-month world tour that will push him to his absolute limit with no concern for the consequences.Armitage Hux is the manager tasked with taking care of the man behind it all - Ben Solo, whose own demons have only recently been subdued and who is finding that the burden of being Kylo Ren on an ever-expanding stage is starting to wear him down and tempt him back to bad habits. As their relationship develops and they grow closer, Hux becomes determined to protect Ben from those who wish to exploit him, but he finds himself challenged at every turn by the people they're supposed to trust the most.(Title from 'The Other Side of Paradise' by Glass Animals. Please see the notes at the beginning of this fic for an expansion on the tags and warnings!)





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! So, this is by no means my first fic, but it's my first ever Star Wars fic and I'm so so excited to finally get this written. This will be a multi-chapter fic and a semi-slow burn, but not slow enough to warrant its own tag. Please note that the rating is subject to change as I add more chapters, depending on the severity and frequency of the following tags: recreational drug use, car accidents, oral sex, anal sex. I have the entire plot mapped out from start to finish but the chapters aren't yet written in detail, so I can't be sure yet how those tags will look on paper.
> 
> A quick note on the additional tags for this fic: obviously, it looks pretty bleak at first glance. This fic won't be all doom and gloom, there'll be happy moments and fluffy moments peppered throughout and I can ultimately guarantee a happy ending, but I do want everyone to be aware that there will be explicit reference to the use of recreational drugs (including marijuana, LSD and cocaine) and reference to past drug addiction/rehabilitation in this fic. There will also be explicit reference to car accidents resulting in the death of a canon character (Han Solo) and other characters' mental health deterioration as a result of this, though the accident itself happens prior to the beginning of this fic and is only mentioned retrospectively. While nothing is going to be overly graphic or gratuitous, I'd like to just advise everyone to look after themselves, proceed with caution, and only read what you're comfortable with. 
> 
> That's all, and I really hope you enjoy it! <3 Please do comment and let me know what you think, it really helps motivate me to write and get chapters out faster! x

_“Could everyone please take their seats, the press conference will begin in five minutes. Five minutes, seats please.”_

The lights were too bright. White, fluorescent lights that made Hux’s already pale skin appear sickly beneath their glare, grey-tinted like a dying man. He was sure he could hear them buzzing, too, and every so often they would flicker and threaten to worsen the nausea that had been creeping over him for hours. It was all-consuming at that point, making his forehead clammy and his hands tremble where they gripped the lukewarm water bottle that had been shoved in to them by someone whose face had been just a blur. The announcement about the start of the press conference was played through a loudspeaker directly above his head, but for all that it resonated with him it might as well have been a million miles away.

People bustled about in front of him trailing microphone wires and fold-away seats behind them, a tell-tale sign that the entire event had been hastily cobbled together out of necessity, as opposed to anyone’s real desire to be there. The green room – or at least, the room that was acting as one – smelled vile, the sugary tang of cheap alcohol clinging to the carpets and curtains from years of spillages at parties and dinners. It wasn’t doing anything to help his churning stomach, nor was the ancient heater in the corner that was belching out dusty, hot air directly in his face. 

He needed to breathe. He needed fresh air, clean air, he needed the pleasant coolness of the night time outside if he had any hope of getting through the following twenty minutes without any problems. But the moment he stood up, the doors at the other end of the room swung open and Mitaka stuck his head in, looking just as dishevelled as Hux felt. His usually pink cheeks were completely devoid of colour, his hair sticking up on one side where he’d no doubt been tugging his fingers through it nervously.

“Sorry, did you need to go out?”

Hux shook his head on instinct. No, he didn’t need to go out, not if it was inconvenient for everyone else. Not if it meant delaying the inevitable and dragging out the awful waiting game for any longer than it already had been. Best to get it over with, then he could go outside and breathe and throw up if he really had to.

“Alright. They’re ready for you in there. We’ll keep it short, maximum of ten questions and only a minute or so per answer. It’s really just to cover the basics, obviously…” Mitaka cleared his throat and ran a finger under his collar as though it were too tight all of a sudden. “Obviously we can’t tell them any more than what we know ourselves, and at the moment that’s fairly limited. The best we can do is pacify them with the key facts so they won’t go digging for them themselves.”

Hux nodded mechanically and forced his feet to carry him forward across the room. As soon as he was out of range of the heater, a rush of ice-cold air hit him through the open hallway door that he couldn’t honestly say was any better. The sudden change made his stomach lurch precariously, and he had to pause and grip the doorframe for a moment as black spots swam in front of his vision. He was vaguely aware of Mitaka’s hand on his arm and his voice asking him if he was alright, but it sounded so muffled, as though he were speaking around a mouthful of cotton wool. There was a ringing over the top of it, a high-pitched whistle resounding in Hux’s ears that drowned out anything more complex Mitaka had to say.

How long had he been awake now? At least twenty-four hours, if not longer. It had to be longer. It certainly felt like it.

“I’m okay.” Not that the hoarse rasp of his voice sounded anywhere near ‘okay’, but there wasn’t anything to do about it now. He could have some of his water before he started answering questions. People weren’t there because they were concerned about him, anyway, he was just a vessel for some far more important information. Straightening up, Hux sniffed and rubbed a hand over his face, desperately trying to smooth his hair back in to some semblance of a deliberate style. “Come on. They’ll just speculate if we leave them waiting too long.” 

The walk down the hallway was woefully short, and yet he was hyperaware of everything along the way. The squeak of his shoes on the laminate floor, more buzzing lights, the low hum of voices getting louder and louder the closer they came to the room in question. And then, before Hux even had time to properly prepare himself, the door was pulled open for him in a grimly theatrical fashion and dozens of camera flashes blinded him in unison.

Someone had their hand on his elbow, he presumed it was Mitaka, to guide him up the steps at the side of the stage where they’d set up a folding table and three chairs. The room was clearly designed for grander events than this – weddings, birthdays, other parties with crowds and dancing and music. Now it just looked rather pathetic, a few rows of plastic chairs all facing the stage like a school assembly and a myriad of wires and cables littering the floor. 

Hux found his way to his seat without tripping up, which he counted as a small victory among a day of otherwise awful defeats. To his right was a man in a black suit who Hux didn’t recognise, but who he assumed was one of Snoke’s lawyers, required to be present to protect his interests when he couldn’t be there himself. To his left was Finn, whose expression would have appeared neutral to anyone who didn’t know him well, but whose clenched jaw and gritted teeth were blindingly obvious to Hux. It made sense for him to be angry; as Kylo’s bodyguard, so much of the heat for what had happened that night would likely fall on him, despite his complete helplessness to do anything to stop it.

Eventually, after some arm-waving and shushing from Mitaka, the crowd settled enough for him to introduce the three men on stage – not that Hux or Finn needed much introduction to any journalist familiar with Kylo’s career, but he supposed the third man was something of a mystery to everyone. While Mitaka ran through their names and job titles, Hux unscrewed the cap of his water and tried his best not to crinkle the bottle in his shaking hands as he raised it to his lips to take a sip. Nothing spilled in the process – another small victory. 

“We’ll begin with Kylo Ren’s manager and agent, Armitage Hux. We are restricting questions to just ten so please raise your hand if you have something to ask and do not attempt to speak over the answer if you find it unsatisfactory. I would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that we ourselves have not yet received a complete report of the situation at hand and are therefore doing our best to convey to you all that we do know at the present moment. We appreciate your understanding in this matter. Now, who’s first?”

To Mitaka’s credit, he was keeping remarkably calm for a man who was usually so anxious. Hux briefly wondered if the shock of the entire evening meant that pure adrenaline had momentarily taken over, and if Mitaka would even remember saying any of this after a few hours. That thought was enough to distract him to the extent that he almost missed the first question that was asked of him, and only just caught the end. 

“…Paris for?”

Hux blinked. He didn’t even know which reporter had spoken, only that it had been a woman’s voice, somewhere vaguely off to his left. “Sorry,” he said to the room at large, a little thrown off by how hollow his own voice sounded coming through the cheap microphone. “Could you repeat that?”

The woman in question, a petite lady in a lilac skirt-suit with a small notepad clutched in her manicured hands, rose from her chair to make herself more visible and cleared her throat pointedly. “I asked how long you’ve been in Paris for, Armitage.”

It was an odd question, definitely not what he’d been expecting. With everything that had happened, why anybody would be interested in his own personal comings and goings was beyond him. “Two hours,” he said, glancing down to check his watch out of habit. “Just under two hours.”

The next question came without missing a beat, and from that point onwards, Hux didn’t have the luxury of pausing to consider his answers or collect his scrambled thoughts.

_“Where is Kylo Ren now?”_

“Still in the city, as far as I’ve been told. I will not be disclosing a specific location." 

_“Have you spoken to him since you arrived in Paris?”_

“No, just his immediate family.”

_“How are his family responding to the night’s events?”_

“With appropriate concern, but their privacy should be respected.”

_“What does this mean for the upcoming tour?”_

“The tour will regretfully be cancelled. Refunds will be issued in full and our lawyers will arrange compensation for travel where necessary.”

_“Do tonight’s events have any connection to the news that surfaced last night about the late Han Solo?”_

“We would appreciate it if your write-ups of tonight’s events refrain from speculation about Kylo Ren’s personal life. We do not speak on behalf of Han Solo, nor do we represent the surviving members of The Resistance, and I will therefore not be insinuating any link between that news in question and tonight’s occurrences.”

_“Will this mean an end to Kylo Ren’s contract with First Order records?”_

“That is something I cannot comment on tonight, it will require meetings and discussions as soon as both parties are able in order to reach an arrangement that is satisfactory for everybody.”

_“Will this mean an end to Kylo Ren’s career in general?”_

“I think it would be highly inappropriate to make such a judgement based purely on what little we know so far about what exactly…”

**“Can you tell us, without any bullshit, if we’re ever actually going to see Kylo Ren again?” **

The question had come from the back row, from a man who didn’t even look like a legitimate reporter. Standing out from the sea of suits and microphones, the man wore a faded concert t-shirt from one of Kylo’s earliest shows, back when he’d still been playing tiny theatres in small towns and they’d had to float the cost of printing all that merchandise themselves out of sheer hope it would sell. He had a scruffy beard creeping down his neck and stringy hair that looked like it hadn’t seen a shower in weeks, and he was poised to record Hux’s answer with the voice notes app on his phone. Hux was sure that if the press conference had been arranged further in advance the vetting process for suitable journalists would have excluded him easily, but this mess cobbled together in forty minutes could hardly afford to be so selective. No doubt he ran some sort of music news blog, and thought that throwing a curse in with his question would get him the juicy scoop he wanted.

He’d be wrong. The question was too pointed, just too close to home, that Hux completely shut down. Never mind the fact that they’d only got through nine of his allotted ten questions, or that he hadn’t even answered the last question. Never mind the fact whispers had started to spread throughout the crowd and some flashes were going off again sporadically amongst the reporters, eager to catch the moment that Armitage Hux was struck dumb by what should have been a simple enough thing to answer.

Mitaka was trying to get everyone back under control, raising a hand and motioning for silence. “We’re going to move on now, if anyone has any questions for Kylo Ren’s bodyguard Finn we are going to be restricting him to just three, so please…”

Hux stopped paying attention to the rest of it. Noises either side of him had gone back to being nothing more than a dull hum, and although he could see the dents and scratches in the fake wooden floor where his eyes were fixated unblinkingly on the edge of the stage, he wasn’t really taking it in. His mind was cycling back over that question, repeating it like an echo chamber in his head. Were they ever going to see Kylo Ren again? It was almost laughable that that was what they were concerned about. He knew what the man had meant – was there ever going to be new music, new merchandise, new tours and interviews and magazine spreads? There was no real worry there that the person behind all of that might be gone forever, just that the entertainment would be.

No, there was an altogether more daunting question creeping in to Hux’s thoughts now that the floodgates had been opened:

_Was he ever going to see Ben Solo again?_


	2. Four Months Earlier

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's the second chapter! Decently longer than the prologue, of course, and I hope it's okay! Please please leave a comment to let me know what you think, I love reading them so much and they just make my day. Enjoy! <3

**\- FOUR MONTHS EARLIER -**

“And…we’re done! That’s great, Kylo, you can step out the booth now. Thanks a lot, man, that sounded awesome.”

Hux glanced up from the email he was writing, his MacBook perched on his knees as he reclined in one of the leather office chairs gathered around the soundboard. Their sound technician removed his headphones and pulled a crumpled pack of cigarettes from his pocket, already lighting one up as he shouldered his way out of the room to go smoke in the alley outside. There was a brief gust of warm air and the sound of a car horn as the door swung open, swiftly replaced again by the cool air conditioning inside when Hux leaned over to kick it shut. The techie’s departure left more space for Hux to spread himself out, and he wheeled his chair back a little so he could carefully shift the laptop up on to the desk. It was still fairly new, the latest model, a gift from Ben after his last album went platinum; he didn’t particularly want to drop it on the shiny granite floor of the studio.

Ben was busy untangling himself from the cord of his guitar, which he’d managed to get wrapped around one of his legs with all his energetic movements inside the booth. It wasn’t quite dancing, because Ben and all his muscle mass didn’t seem coordinated enough for that - more a flailing of limbs that left him sweating and dishevelled, strands of long black hair clinging to his damp forehead. Somehow he never seemed to get red and flushed like Hux would if he were to similarly fling himself about, something that should have been irritating but that over the years had become oddly endearing. Hux rolled his eyes with a small, fond smile that was gone as soon as it had appeared, turning his attention back to his laptop.

The email was dull, as most of his emails were, but this one was at least important. It finalised once and for all Ben’s departure from First Order Records, the label he’d been signed to since his very first professional studio album five years ago. Its CEO Snoke, who both Hux and Ben had come to blows with on a number of occasions over everything from contracts to tour schedules to album cover art, had sunk his claws in to Ben the moment they’d had their first meeting with him, promising all sorts of exciting things like fame and fortune beyond Ben’s wildest dreams. Perhaps it had been naïve to believe him, but to give him credit, he’d delivered – Kylo Ren was now one of the world’s biggest names, and Ben enjoyed all the luxuries that brought with it. It simply took them a while to realise that Snoke expected a lot in return, with no regard for the strain it put on Ben to constantly act like his personal dancing monkey. After three years of building a successful career with relatively few issues, the past two years had seen Ben take a sharp downward turn with consequences he now resolutely avoided talking about and that could have been much worse, and it was during the aftermath of that whole mess that he had made the decision to break from First Order completely and make the leap to Rebel Records.

Rebel was a small company by comparison with very few big names on their books, but Kylo Ren had enough of a following by that point to ensure the shift wouldn’t be detrimental to his fanbase in any way. They’d toured the studio space and offices on one of the rare occasions Ben had been let out of rehab, listening patiently as the representative reeled off figures and statistics about their growing profits and influence. None of that had mattered to Ben or Hux by then, not that they told them that; really, what they needed from Rebel was somewhere stable, unobtrusive, cooperative and reasonable. Somewhere Ben could come to work without feeling pressured in to taking on more than he could handle. Once they’d confirmed that it was the right place, Hux had begun the paperwork for the move immediately. It was only now, just over half a year since Ben’s release from rehab and their last contact with anyone from First Order, that Hux was finally sending over the last of the documents that cut ties with them completely.

He finished his email and added his digital signature just as Ben got the door to the booth open, successfully freed of his guitar cord. Ben had a dopey smile on his face and was using the bottom of his t-shirt to wipe the sweat off his face, exposing the ridiculous expanse of abdominal muscles above the waistband of his equally ridiculous tight jeans. As he approached the desk Hux spun the laptop around to show him the screen, leaning back in his chair with a satisfied smile. “You’re officially free,” he declared, in case Ben didn’t bother to read through the paragraphs of legal jargon Hux had painstakingly typed out. He ran his finger along one of the closing sentences of the email to highlight the most important point. “Ben Solo no longer has any obligations to First Order Records, and they are no longer affiliated with Kylo Ren and his catalogue of music.”

Ben grinned, using the toe of his boot to roll Hux’s chair out of the way so he could lean in and do the honours of sending the email off himself. Hux indulged him, deciding that after everything he had been through at the hands of Snoke and First Order it was only fair to give him the ceremony of hitting ‘send’ on the documents that liberated him. “Perfect,” he said, straightening up again and wandering over to the back of the room, where their bags sat on a black leather sofa and a small mini-fridge stood whirring in the corner. “Just in time for this, then.” He bent down and rummaged in said fridge for a moment before producing a bottle of champagne, the brand of which Hux knew to be expensive and therefore not likely to have been purchased by Rebel or anyone employed by them.

“You bought that?” he asked, raising an eyebrow as he shut the lid of his laptop and rose from his chair. Technically Ben had ended up in rehab for his misuse of drugs, but Hux – and the doctors he’d spoken to on Ben’s behalf – still strongly advised he stay away from alcohol as a general rule. Quite honestly Hux was slightly annoyed that Ben’s bodyguard had let him get as far as actually spending money on drinks himself – he’d have to have a word with Finn the next time he saw him. He eyed the bottle suspiciously as though it could be personally responsible for another disaster, earning himself a dismissive snort from Ben.

“Come on, don’t look at me like that. It’s a celebration, I’m only gonna have one glass.” Ben sighed, wiggling the bottle in one hand and the two chilled glasses he’d plucked out with it in the other. “C’mon,” he said again, a slow smile spreading over his face as he watched Hux’s resolve weaken and crumble in to nothing. 

“How have I put up with you for seven years,” Hux muttered, walking over to join him and reluctantly letting him pop the cork on the champagne with a triumphant ‘whoop’. There wasn’t a hint of pure malice or irritation in his voice – if anything, this was his way of lightening the mood a little. One thing they could both count on when things got intense was their uncanny ability to tease one another, poke and prod without ever causing any real damage. Hux had been in Ben’s court since before anyone knew his name beyond the connection to his father, since he was playing tiny venues with an audience of five or so random people who just so happened to be there already when he got on stage. “How am I going to put up with you for God only knows how many more?”

Ben grinned and handed him the first glass he poured out, waiting for the bubbles to subside before topping him off. “You could try taking the stick out your ass, that might help.”

Hux thumped him gently on the arm with his free hand, but Ben’s smile was infectious, and he had to hide it by raising the glass to his lips. “Alright then, what are we toasting?” he asked, now itching to take a sip as the aroma of the wine drifted up from the glass. It even smelled expensive, and Hux would be lying if he said he didn’t also enjoy the finer things in life that came from being linked so closely to Ben. Laptops and champagne were only a small fraction of the things he’d been able to do and buy since Ben had blown up – travelling the world, staying in five-star hotels, it was all part of the package. He wasn’t blind to the fact he should enjoy it while he could. Fame was fickle, after all, even for a man like Ben at the top of his game, and he could be damn sure that if Ben were to suddenly fall out of public favour he would go down with him completely willingly. 

Raising his glass with more theatricality than Hux thought strictly necessary, Ben seemed to contemplate his choice of words for a moment. “To my freedom from that wrinkled ballsack of a producer,” he eventually decided on, clinking his glass against Hux’s and immediately tipping his head back to drink.

It was so crass it startled a true belly laugh out of Hux, and he had to take a good minute to calm down enough to drink without the risk of spitting it back out again. Hux prided himself on maintaining a cool, professional composure at all times, primarily so he could be there as a counterbalance for when Ben’s temper was getting the best of him. But occasionally it slipped, almost exclusively as a result of something Ben did or said and never in the presence of anyone else.

Which was why, when he heard the lock on the door beep and release, he cleared his throat and drowned the last of his laughter in a sip of what turned out to be exquisite champagne. He glanced over casually to see who had come in, as if he and Ben had just been discussing business and not giggling like children over a naughty word. Finn was propping the door open with his foot, his hands full holding a cardboard tray of disposable coffee cups from the studio’s café. He was holding the door for Ben’s cousin Rey, who herself was carrying a black lever arch file stuffed with plastic wallets full of documents.

“We thought you might need something to drink, but it looks like you’ve got that covered already,” Rey said, dumping the file unceremoniously on the sofa beside Hux’s bag and straightening up with her hands on her hips. Her expression was like an open book – judgemental towards Hux for letting Ben drink, judgemental towards Ben for not waiting for her to arrive so she could at least share with them.

“Oh, that’s fine, we’ll take those to go. Ben’s only having one drink.” Hux plucked the empty glass from Ben’s hand with a smug smirk, setting it on top of the mini fridge and deftly swapping it out for one of the coffees from the tray, which he slotted in to Ben’s waiting hand like a cupholder. 

Ben rolled his eyes and looked as though he were two seconds away from sticking his tongue out at Hux like a child. “Bite me.” 

“Adorable.” Rey, usually the embodiment of sunshine to the extent that it almost got on Hux’s nerves, had still managed to perfect the art of making one word carry as much sarcasm and bite as a whole carefully constructed sentence. It was something she’d inherited from her father, and something Hux admired her for greatly. “Hux, I brought the file up from downstairs, Mitaka just had to confirm a couple of the venues but it’s all sorted now, everything in there is finalised. There’s a list of potential openers too, and their numbers if you want to call them for a live audition – Mitaka said to let him know if you need to use the studio space for that.”

Mitaka was essentially Rebel Records’ answer to Snoke, and altogether infinitely more bearable to deal with. Generally highly strung yet unwaveringly good-natured, he was dependable if a little absent-minded when it came to ensuring things were done on time. For a less established artist with fewer years of experience in the industry that might have presented a problem, but Hux found it incredibly liberating to be given free reign over their business with minimal input from upper management. Mitaka seemed to trust him to know what was best for Ben, and for Kylo Ren as a brand, and most often just signed off on Hux’s requests for funds and approvals with a ‘good luck!’ and a characteristically anxious smile.

“Openers?” Ben asked, pulling Hux from his thoughts. He’d popped the lid off his coffee and was blowing away the steam from the surface with alarming vigour for someone whose lungs had just worked to record half an album’s worth of songs, and Hux kept one eye on him to ensure the boiling liquid didn’t slosh right out on to his hand. It wouldn’t have been the first time.

“Mm, for the tour. You’ll have a support act, and Rebel want you to use one of their newer artists for some exposure. We’ll go over them at the house, don’t worry. I think most of them have YouTube channels we can look over, right…?” Hux glanced at Rey for confirmation, and she looked up from where she was pouring herself some champagne in Ben’s discarded glass to nod at him.

“Some are…better than others." 

One thing Hux liked about having Rey – and Finn, really – around was their lack of connection to either First Order or Rebel Records. Finn was an independent bodyguard hired through an agency who they’d found four years ago, and Rey – while not officially employed as Ben’s staff due to her still being in college – was purely there for moral support, always on Ben’s side and fiercely protective of him. It meant they could freely discuss any shortcomings of either label, and their affiliated artists, without risk of offence.

“There has to be at least one decent option,” Hux said, trying to cast his mind back to the couple of people they’d seen recording when they’d first toured the studio. There’d been the young Asian girl whose powerful vocals Ben had stopped to listen to when he’d got bored of being fed dull information, and in the booth beyond that another young woman with blonde hair in braids who’d been wailing some sort of indie ballad. Beyond that Hux had very little knowledge of the musicians Rebel Records had signed, since the studio didn’t yet boast any platinum records – though he privately believed that would soon change once Kylo Ren’s first album under their production was released – and he therefore couldn’t read any key names off the walls of the corridors, which had been his preferred way of sizing up the competition back at First Order. If you had a platinum record up on the wall there, especially in the hall leading up to Snoke’s office, it meant you’d made it big and you were a name to watch out for.

Rey shrugged, sipping her champagne and gesturing to the file again. “Well, they’re all in there, either way. If Ben’s only having one glass of this, can I take the rest of it? I’ll share it with dad.”

Ben snorted. “Luke doesn’t drink, nice try. She’s worse than me.” He directed that last part to Hux, half-preoccupied with fitting the lid back on his coffee.

“Uh.” From the doorway Finn cleared his throat and shuffled from foot to foot. “You guys still need me to drive you back to the house, or…?” Ah, of course, Hux remembered as soon as he spoke up that Finn’s shift officially ended at six each evening unless Ben was scheduled to attend an event or go out in public for any extended period of time, like out to dinner or to a club – the latter of which had been strongly discouraged as a precaution in his recovery. It was now approaching twenty to six, and with LA traffic it was likely he’d get off work late if they hung about much longer.   
  
Hux nodded and went to grab his coffee from him to free his hands up, discarding the cardboard tray in the waste paper basket beneath the desk. “Of course, sorry, we’re done here for the day, I don’t want to keep you.” He fetched his bag from the sofa, a smart black leather satchel that fit his laptop perfectly but left him to carry the large file separately in his arms. “Ben?”

“I could drive.” Ben shrugged, casting a hopeful smile at Hux that he was clearly trying very hard to make look nonchalant.

“No.” Hux shook his head firmly and waved his hand at him in a vague gesture for him to collect his own bag, a much less smart gym bag stamped with an Adidas logo and mostly just containing Ben’s leather jacket and headphones.

Once they’d gathered their belongings and said goodbye to Rey, whose plans to stick around and shadow some of the sound mixers until Finn could come back to collect her later meant she was staying behind, the three of them made their way out to the parking lot and headed for Ben’s sleek black Porsche. Despite the money currently sitting in Ben’s account he really didn’t have many indulgences, but cars were the main thing he ever spent big on. The garage back at his home contained a collection of around ten different sports cars ranging in make and model and colour, a couple of them classic and inherited from Han – barely touched, often left under canvas in the corner of the room, and definitely never driven – but most of them brand new. Hux knew of a couple that hadn’t even hit the market yet, but somehow Ben had gotten his hands on them. By comparison to some of the others, the Porsche was tame. 

Hux went around to the trunk of the car first to put away his bag, but Ben beat him to it and held it open for him so he could toss his own in too. “C’mon, let me drive,” he tried again, his voice bordering on a whine. If he thought Hux was going to buckle and give in to two of his destructive habits in one afternoon, he could think again.

“No, Ben. It’s the middle of rush hour, I’m not getting in that car with you so you can drag race with thousands of other commuters on the road. Not to mention you’ve had something to drink – forget it.” Hux didn’t have the energy to argue. Despite it being mid-September it was still oppressively hot in Los Angeles, a humid and sticky heat that completely disagreed with both Hux’s complexion and English upbringing. He was completely fine for as long as he was inside an air conditioned building, but the moment he stepped out in to the direct line of the sun he lost all his patience. 

Ben, at least, had a good seven years of experience dealing with Hux and his weather-dependent temperament, and closed the argument before it could really start by simply rolling his eyes and climbing in the back of the car. Finn was already up front with the engine running, adjusting his mirrors and seat as though demonstrating a model example of what a responsible driver looked like in contrast to Ben’s chaotic enthusiasm.

The ride back to the house was quiet, the radio playing faintly in the background for the majority of the twenty-five minutes they were in the car. Ben occupied himself staring out of the tinted window at the admittedly dreary scenery of the packed freeway, and Hux almost compulsively refreshed his emails to check if anyone from First Order had got back to him yet confirming they’d received the severance documents. Eventually, as Finn was driving up the winding mountain road that led to the stretch of mansions all belonging to some celebrity or another, a very automated and generic email finally appeared and his anxious curiosity was satisfied. Ben was now finally free, once and for all.

Ben’s house was one of a relatively uniformed group designed to look as luxurious yet inoffensive to the eye as possible, a blank canvas for the unique, creative minds who bought them to customise as they desired. At least, that was what the real estate agent had said as they trailed around after her four and a half years ago, Ben buzzing with excitement and Hux going over a mental checklist of important things to ask before Ben went and signed anything. Ben, for his part, hadn’t done too much in the way of customisation. The rooms were fairly minimalist, white or grey walls with black leather sofas and glass or marble tables, mostly chosen by Hux when Ben expressed no real interest in interior design. There were a few odd features that Ben had been adamant about – for example, the water feature that sprouted up out of the living room floor in a dome shape that he claimed was invaluable for his meditation and therefore his writing process, or the fact that in his bedroom his bed was sunken down in a sort of pit so he was sleeping level with the rest of the floor. It gave the place the feeling of being some sort of hut, like the kind you would go camping in, as opposed to the master bedroom of a luxury mansion. But Ben insisted it brought him peace when he was trying to sleep, and Hux couldn’t argue with that when it already seemed hard enough for sleep to come to Ben.

Hux thanked Finn and retrieved their things from the trunk of the car as Ben barrelled ahead into the house, and it was only once he’d watched him drive away again that he turned to follow him inside. He could never be completely sure that the paparazzi wouldn’t make a sudden appearance, as they’d gone through a period of following the car to and from the studio back at First Order in an attempt to catch a glimpse of Ben leaving. They’d always caught on before they got anywhere near the neighbourhood and diverted the car so as not to give Ben’s address away, but Hux still made a habit of checking they hadn’t been tailed before he went in and locked the door behind them.

Ben had made a beeline for the sofa where he’d sprawled himself out in an apparent bid to take up the most space possible, so Hux chose the next comfiest option, a leather bucket chair just off to one side and still in full view of the TV. It would be easiest for them to pull up the YouTube channels of their potential openers that way, so Hux wasn’t constantly turning his laptop around to show him.

At a loss for where the remote was, Hux dug around down by his sides to determine whether it had slipped beneath the cushion of the seat, only to frown when his fingers grasped something made of stretchy, soft fabric. He gave the mystery object a sharp tug, and then proceeded to drop it like a hot coal as soon as he saw what it actually was. A pair of men’s underwear, bright red and definitely too small for Ben, lay in a crumpled pile on the floor by the side of his chair. “Well,” Hux said, his voice reverting back to the prim received pronunciation that only seemed to really make an appearance when he was particularly offended by something. “That explains why you were late getting out to the car this morning.”

Ben didn’t even have the good grace to look ashamed, just shooting Hux another of those dopey smiles and folding his arms underneath his head like the picture of ease. Of course he was bloody at ease, Hux thought, if he’d been rolling around in bed with someone just that morning. It was nothing new – Hux was sure Ben’s list of conquests since hitting the bigtime was long enough to constitute an epic poem by that point – but for some reason he couldn’t explain it never quite sat right with him to be reminded of it so vividly. Once he’d let himself in to Ben’s house one morning only to find a mostly naked man standing in the kitchen attempting to figure out the fancy coffee machine, a very obvious tent in the front of his boxers. Hux had taken to ringing the doorbell and waiting after that, despite the fact he’d had a key to Ben’s home since he bought the place.

“Show me our options, then?” Ben asked, nodding towards the TV as if to draw Hux’s attention to the fact he’d got lost in his thoughts for a minute. Ben did like it when Hux’s undivided attention was on him – it seemed even Hux’s own mind presented some sort of challenge to Ben, like Hux was somehow playing favourites between him and his own goddamn stream of consciousness. Ben had the remote in his hand and was letting it dangle lazily in Hux’s general vicinity.

Hux sighed and flipped the file open in his lap, leafing through the first few plastic wallets until he found what he wanted. The majority of those wallets contained important documents for the travelling part of the upcoming tour – photocopies of both their passports and licenses and visas, plane tickets and itineraries, reservations at hotels and call sheets for sound checks at each venue. Eventually he found what he was looking for, the sheet of paper containing a list of all the possible openers currently signed to Rebel Records, in seemingly no particular order. He plucked the remote from Ben’s hand and brought up YouTube on the wall-mounted TV, working from the top of the list down. 

Some of the faces were recognisable, barely. There was one of the two girls Hux remembered seeing, though unfortunately it was the less impressive blonde one – evidently the more talented of the pair was too busy with her own budding career to open for somebody else for two months, and quite rightly so. Many of the other artists had a similar feel – a lot of the women had soft, wavering voices that Hux feared would be lost on a crowd of Kylo Ren fans, while a lot of the men were either so high pitched it made Hux wince or so low pitched it was difficult to tell what they were saying. None of them were untalented, he respected each of them for what they could do for themselves, but nobody seemed like a good fit for the atmosphere of a Kylo Ren concert.

It was Ben who eventually forced him to stop and give one of them a proper second look. The man himself was handsome in an almost old-Hollywood way, with soft brown eyes and even softer brown curls. He had his own guitar and evidently knew how to play it, and despite it being acoustic where Ben preferred electric Hux could tell that it made an impression on him. His videos on YouTube were simple too, none of the cinematography some of the others had attempted; just him, sat in a room outfitted with a tapestry rug and a couple of plants, singing and playing the guitar alone. Hux liked the simplicity of it, the honesty of it. His vocals were husky in a pleasing way, strong and yet intimate. He liked his talent.

What he didn’t like so much, for a reason he couldn’t honestly pinpoint, was the immediate and intense interest Ben took in him.

“What’s his name?”

Hux checked the list. “Hm…Poe Dameron. He’s been signed to Rebel Records for a little over two years, though he prefers to produce most of his work independently and tends to utilise Rebel as more of a tool for collaboration. Which I suppose bodes well for us, if you decide you want him.” He didn’t know where that exact phrasing came from, but he did his best not to question it too deeply. There was a photo of Poe on the sheet along with his phone number and email address, a warm-toned image that highlighted a darker complexion completely on the opposite end of the colour spectrum to Hux’s ghostly pale skin and bright red hair.

“I like him.” Ben was tapping his foot – still in his boots, right up against the couch, Hux noted with some irritation – along to the music still playing from the TV, a crooked smile on his face. “Can we meet him in person, can you set that up with Mitaka?” 

Evidently, Ben didn’t want to consider any of the others. To be perfectly honest, neither did Hux. He had to admit that Poe Dameron was the strongest candidate vocally, and if he had a genuine interest in collaborating with other artists then at least he might be dependable. It would be easier for Hux, after all, if their opener could take care of and handle themselves on tour without him having to babysit and coddle them the entire way.

“Alright,” he said eventually, using a red pen to draw an asterisk by Poe’s name before sliding the piece of paper back in to its plastic wallet. “I can call him tomorrow morning and hopefully Mitaka will have the studio free to audition later in the d…” He was cut off by the sound of a door slamming upstairs in the house, and then another door opening shortly after. Hux’s gaze shot directly to Ben, whose eyes widened a fraction before he had the good sense to at least look sheepish. “He’s still here?” Hux hissed, now keeping his voice low just in case the stranger upstairs could hear him.

Ben shrugged in a ‘what can you do’ gesture, shaking his head frantically. “I thought he’d show himself out!” he whispered back, pushing himself up to listen out more carefully for the man’s movements upstairs. A few minutes later, the door opened and closed again, then another, and then it went silent. Bathroom, then, most likely. Hux briefly wondered if he’d stolen anything – that was something that had happened more times than Ben would care to admit, and sometimes if Hux was feeling particularly malicious or irritated he would remind him of it.

“Do you want me to go and get rid of him?” Hux asked, raising an eyebrow. He’d done it for Ben before, gone up and told the guest of honour that something had come up and that they needed to leave as Kylo Ren was a very busy man who very much appreciated their time together but unfortunately had business to attend to now. Sometimes it worked, other times he’d just have to slip them a hundred dollars and watch as their greedy little eyes lit up on their way out to the front door.

Ben shook his head. “Nah. Since he’s still here, might as well make the most of it.” 

Hux’s face twisted in to a grimace. “You’re a brute,” he muttered, standing up and smoothing out invisible creases in his trousers. “I’m taking one of the cars, I’ll bring it back tomorrow when I collect you for Dameron’s audition.” There was only one car in Ben’s extensive collection that Hux would drive, and that was the Tesla, purely because it wasn’t obnoxiously loud and it had never been used in one of Ben’s ridiculous late-night drag races so there was no risk of the plates being picked up by police scanners. “Don’t be late again in the morning.”

Ben grinned, already kicking off his boots. “No promises,” he said, dropping Hux a wink that was exaggerated on purpose yet still somehow came across with an edge of sincerity.

Hux rolled his eyes, turned his back, and made for the door. It didn’t bother him. Ben was free to do what he liked with who he liked, provided it wasn’t a danger to himself, and it was this that Hux repeated to himself in his head as he was aware of Ben running up the stairs in his peripheral vision. It was this that he repeated to himself as he made his way round to the garage and fetched the correct set of keys off the wall hook, and again as he climbed in to the car and pulled out in to the driveway.

He would be glad of the distraction when the tour was in full swing, he decided. Glad, but it wasn’t without an edge of concern. Historically, time spent on tour marked time that the persona of Kylo Ren started to bleed more and more in to Ben Solo, and it was always then that temptations to sink back in to old habits were at their strongest. This time had to be different, Hux knew, because Ben Solo couldn’t handle Kylo Ren taking over once more. It had nearly killed him last time, and there was no way Hux was going to stand by and let it happen again.

At least, not if he could help it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who's reached this point and is concerned - don't worry, Ben/Poe is NOT going to be a pairing at any point during this fic, not as a one night stand or a relationship or anything else beyond colleagues/friends. That doesn't mean Hux won't THINK there's something going on, but in reality, there's no romance there. Just wanted to make that clear for anyone who's put off by the Poe/Ben ship! <3 
> 
> Please comment and let me know what you're thinking so far! x


	3. Poe Dameron

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again I'd just like to reassure everyone that Poe/Ben is at no point going to become canon in this fic, not in any capacity beyond friends/colleagues. Enjoy!

Poe Dameron, as it turned out, was a gift.

By the end of the three songs he’d prepared for his audition Hux had to admit that the man oozed an effortless charm that, coupled with the smooth sounds of his voice drifting over the strumming of his guitar, made a complete package. He’d greeted them both with a firm handshake and a bright smile, falling into easy conversation with Ben as though they’d known each other for years as opposed to having just met while Hux busied himself with setting out his things on the studio desk. Even his clothes seemed to fit the image they were trying to shoot for, simply substituting the characteristic black leather of Ben’s Kylo Ren jackets for a warmer brown leather instead. Autumn and winter, like two sides of the same coin. They were a good match, it was undeniable.

Ben had been tapping his foot along to Poe’s playing through his entire set, staring across the room at him with eyes like a lovestruck schoolboy. He and Hux were sat beside one another in a small carpeted room with foam soundproofing insulation on the walls, a few feet away from where Poe perched on a stool to perform for them. Mitaka had offered to book them in to a proper recording studio for the purpose of Poe’s audition but Hux had declined on the grounds that they’d prefer to hear his voice raw without the separation of glass and speakers, since they were testing how he’d perform live. The effect it created was rather intimate, and Hux was questioning his decision by the time the final notes died down and the silence left in the room crackled with palpable, electric tension.

Hux took a sip of his coffee, pretending the smell of the dark roast was particularly interesting so he could hide his expression behind his cup as Ben shot up out of his seat to go and pat Poe on the back and drag him in to a one-armed embrace. Poe was grinning from ear to ear and somehow wasn’t out of breath even after three back-to-back songs, tipping his head to one side to flip an errant curl from his eyes as Ben circled his stool like some sort of animal stalking its prey.

Ben stroked his fingers over the smooth wood of Pope’s guitar admiringly. “This is awesome,” he was saying, voice low in the tell-tale way he spoke when he was trying to really put the moves on someone. Hux had heard it many times at award shows and after-parties, while he’d been trailing around behind him listening to him flirt with everyone from other artists to seat-fillers. And now it was turned towards Poe. Or, more accurately, Poe’s guitar. “This has gotta be custom, right?” 

“Nah, man. She _is_ one of a kind, though. Got her from this guy in Guatemala who hand-makes each one totally unique, takes ages but the result is incredible. If you ever wanted, I could put you in touch...”

Hux tuned out, plucking the tour contract from its plastic file and grabbing a stapler off the desk in the corner. Despite having spent years as Ben’s manager and enduring some stuffy piano lessons as a child, he really didn’t know the first thing about music or instruments and therefore felt no desire whatsoever to eavesdrop on that particular conversation; his talents lay purely in the planning, the execution of Ben’s career. Even that had been spotty at first, with Hux’s personality too prickly for him to find work with anyone else and Ben’s initial resistance to being told what to do almost coming in between their working relationship before it had started. They’d met at the student union bar on Hux’s campus at Arkanis University, the same week he was handing in his dissertation for his business MS and subsequently looking to get blackout drunk. Ben had been hanging around as company for Rey, who’d been a year away from starting her undergrad at the time and who’d got Ben to drive her around the country to look at colleges. Ben had gone rogue while Rey was at a dinner meet-up with other potential student hopefuls, and Hux had found him monopolising the mic during karaoke. After several songs that left the audience appropriately impressed, Hux’s opening line had been to practically demand to know who his manager was. Upon learning he didn’t have one, and spending several minutes berating him for bad career practice, they’d struck up a tenuous agreement and exchanged numbers. Sober the next morning, things had progressed with surprising ease as they grew comfortable with each other, both as shocked as the other at the prospect of not having at least some level of disdain for another person for once.

Usually it would be customary for he and Ben to take some time to deliberate and reach a decision together over matters like supporting acts, but it was already quite clear they’d be going with Poe. Besides anything else, neither of them had been overly impressed with the other options presented to them, while Poe seemed to be a gift sent from above designed to fit their image perfectly, with his bright smile and soft curls and genuine laugh that was currently filling out the room alongside Ben’s deeper chuckle.

Hux jammed the stapler through the contract, perhaps with a little more force than necessary.

When he next looked up, Ben and Poe were both staring at him, Ben with owlish wide eyes and Poe with a raised eyebrow. 

“What?”

Ben rubbed the back of his neck and gestured to the table with his free hand, seemingly unable to look at him directly all of a sudden. “You got the thing for him to sign?” An awkward silence had settled over the room, and Hux was certain he saw Poe smirk at him as he stood up to bring the contract over to them. It wasn’t long, just three pages setting out the hours Poe would be expected to put in for rehearsals and sound checks per week, the financial allowances he’d be given while on the road for food and accommodation, and of course the length of the tour itself – a full two months, to begin in just two weeks’ time.

“Here.” Hux held out a pen for Poe at almost arm’s length, along with the contract, like Poe was something quarantined that he wasn’t supposed to touch. Even from that distance he could smell a pleasant, woody cologne on him, masculine and warm and quite frankly infuriating. He wasn’t sure if it was the man’s easy confidence in himself that bothered him so much, or the little condescending quirk of his lips that was still there even as he read over the contract and scrawled a quick signature at the bottom, but it was getting on his nerves to no end. Ben had drifted off to the other side of the room, pretending he was very interested in a piece of loose insulation.

As soon as the contract was signed, Hux cleared his throat and Ben’s attention snapped back to the centre of the room. “Right. Well.” He returned to the desk to put the papers back in their file, which he in turn slid safely into his satchel to be filed with Mitaka later. “Thank you, Mr Dameron. We’ll be in touch next week with a detailed itinerary and Visa paperwork for the dates outside the US, your only task is to ensure your passport is up to date and won’t expire before we get back.”

“Think I can just about manage that.” Poe grinned, and Hux sort of wanted to hit him. He turned his back on him and went to go pack his guitar carefully back into its case, flipping the clasps shut with a tap of his finger. “And please, call me Poe, Mr Dameron sounds way too formal.” He was looking at Ben when he said the last part, Hux momentarily forgotten.

Hux smiled tightly. “Poe, then. Thank you for your time today. We’ve booked a taxi to take you back to wherever you need to go.”

This seemed to reanimate Ben, who until that moment had been looking back and forth between Hux and Poe like he was watching a tennis match. “I’ll walk you out,” he said quickly, shouldering away from the wall and sticking his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket as he loped out of the room after Poe. The minute the door closed, a blissful silence settled over the studio and Hux sank into his chair again with a sigh.

So they had an opener. It was good, one less problem to worry about as the start of the tour drew nearer. There was enough to think about already: outfits for Ben to wear on stage, arranging hotels and overnight parking for the tour bus on the nights hotels weren’t practical, budgets for catering and roadies. Mitaka had done his best with arranging venues for the actual shows themselves, but that was where his influence ended. The rest, the logistical side of things, was all down to Hux. He refused to have a team of people all chipping in after the last time they’d tried this back at First Order, when Ben had been stuck sleeping on the tour bus for three months in the interest of being cost-effective with a shoestring budget for food that left him with an iron deficiency by the end of the tour. He wouldn’t risk that again, he’d much prefer to have matters in his own hands and retain control, but he had to admit the list of tasks was endless without even beginning to think about Poe and his big personality being there for all of it. Before too long a sharp pain had started to form behind Hux’s eyes, and he closed them with a quiet groan and pinched the bridge of his nose, leaning his elbows on the desk. 

He was left alone for all of five minutes, and in that time he came close to drifting off to sleep until a pair of big hands suddenly landed on his shoulders, bolting him from the drowsy lull he’d slipped in to. 

“_Jesus_, Ben!” he gasped, grabbing at his heart and looking over his shoulder at him with wild eyes. “Scared the shit out of me. What are you doing?”

Ben grinned, the awkwardness from earlier having evaporated now that it was just the two of them left in the building. “Sorry,” he chuckled, completely unremorseful. “Walked Poe out. He’s cool, right? Good choice.” He said it like Hux had been the one to pick him, like he’d had any sort of strong opinion on hiring him. Confident that he wouldn’t almost give Hux another heart attack, he settled his hands back on his shoulders and started to rub them gently, digging his thumbs in to a particularly tense spot at the nape of his neck. “You feel like your spine’s made out of metal, you know. You really need to relax. When was the last time you got laid, again?”

Hux rolled his eyes, though Ben couldn’t see since his head was practically laying on the desk by that point. “We’re absolutely not having this conversation.”

He could sense, rather than see, Ben’s answering grin. Fortunately Ben fell silent for a while and just focused on what his hands were doing, while Hux clamped his lower lip between his teeth and resolutely tried not to make any noise despite how good it felt.

It was ruined when Ben announced in to the quiet, “I’ve invited Poe out to dinner tonight.”

Hux was sure Ben could feel it when his shoulders tensed up again. His suspicions were confirmed a second later when Ben hooked his foot around the height control lever on Hux’s chair and spun him around to face him, crouching down to bring himself to his eye-level. Hux looked at him blankly, refusing to give anything away in his expression.

“What’s going on with you today?” Ben demanded, hands on the arms of the chair to bracket Hux in place as though he’d try to bolt. “You look like someone told you your cat died.”

“Don’t speak that into existence. If anything happens to her now I’ll know who to blame.”

“Hux.” 

Sighing, Hux folded his arms over his chest and tipped his chin up, feigning an air of cool indifference. “I’m perfectly fine. Just tired – I spent last night transferring all your finances and insurance plans to Rebel, so. I think it’s perfectly understandable I’m not operating at 100%.” He knew Ben hated when he phrased things like that, as though he were an machine instead of an actual person, but it was the easiest way for Hux to explain how he was feeling. To his ears, complaining that he just didn’t quite like the vibe Poe gave off or that the thought of them going to dinner put a bad taste in his mouth sounded far too much like whining, and he’d been taught from a very young age to never do that.

Ben, for his part, didn’t look like he believed him for a second.

In an effort to distract him and drop the subject completely, Hux sniffed and checked the time on his Rolex. “Shouldn’t you be leaving soon, to get ready? When’s dinner?" 

Clearly Ben wasn’t interested in an impromptu therapy session that afternoon, because he took the bait and straightened up to let Hux free from his chair. “At seven. I made reservations at that hotel restaurant, remember, the one we went to to celebrate when I closed on the house? That one. Figured that way we could get a drink after if we want, I remember the bar was nice.”

Hux raised an eyebrow incredulously. “You made the reservations yourself?”

“Of course. I’m not a complete child without you, you know.” Ben shrugged, fumbling in his pocket and retrieving a battered-looking cigarette that Hux grimaced at. It wasn’t necessarily the smoking he objected to, more so the…tastelessness of keeping them loose in his pockets. Ben smirked at the look he was sending him, sticking the cigarette between his lips so his voice came out muffled around it, “Besides, it’s meant to be my treat, can’t make you make reservations for something you’re a guest to.”

Hux had been busy packing up his things to leave, but he stopped when Ben said that, narrowing his eyes at him. “Excuse me? A guest? I was under the impression this would be a dinner for you and Dameron.”

Ben shook his head, hair flopping over his large ears where he’d had it pushed back. “Nah.” He took the cigarette out again so he could talk properly. “It’s to celebrate signing him. You’re the one that signed him. Ergo, you have to be there. Sorry, I don’t make the rules.” 

“_’Ergo’_. Big word, there.”

“Fuck you.” Ben shook his head with a smile and grabbed his scratched zippo lighter from his pocket, the paint of the old logo of The Resistance peeling off a little more every time Hux saw it. He threw it up in the air and caught it for dramatic effect, jerking his head towards the door. “You coming out for a smoke? Finn’s ready to take us back after.”

“I can’t. I have to go and see Mitaka, I’ll be here for a while longer today. You seriously want me at that dinner later?”

“I _seriously_ want you at that dinner later.”

Hux sighed and rubbed a hand over his forehead. “Fine. Have Finn take you home and then send him off for the day, I’ll arrange a car for myself. I’ll want to change clothes anyway.” The restaurant, as he recalled, had a very hierarchical dress code system – essentially, if you were famous you could get away with wearing nothing but a sack if you wanted to, but if you were just adjacent to someone famous then you had to make an effort. If you were a nobody, you simply didn’t get in at all.

Ben nodded and gave Hux a little salute, kicking his way out the door and in to the car park outside where Finn was passing the time texting Rey.

For a minute Hux just stood and stared at the door in his wake, an uncomfortable feeling settling in his stomach. Trying his best to stamp it down and chalk it up to a lack of sleep and the stress of tour planning, he slipped his satchel over his shoulder and made his way towards Mitaka’s office with that night’s plans weighing heavily on his mind.

* * *

If Hux had thought Poe’s audition was a struggle, then he had been completely unprepared for dinner with him. In a total contradiction to Hux’s earlier theory, Poe had been allowed into the restaurant in what could only be described as smart-casual wear, the top three buttons of his shirt undone and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair was tousled just the same as it had been earlier, and his trousers were just a little too tight to be called formal. It was enough to attract the attention of other diners when he walked over to their table, drawing almost as many whispers and covert photographs as Ben had. That was an impressive feat in itself – Ben always ended up getting recognised wherever they went, but people didn’t tend to care about who he had with him. Except, apparently, that night.

Hux had never felt more like an employee than he did sitting at that table with the pair of them. Ben was generally very good at making Hux feel like an equal; there was the obvious fact that Ben – or at least, Kylo Ren – was incredibly famous and wealthy and a household name while Hux was just one of those three things, but Ben made a careful point to never draw attention to it, to never make Hux feel inferior or like an outsider just because his job placed him behind a desk instead of on a stage. 

That night was the only time he felt the divide like a chasm between them.

It didn’t help that the table was a round one, and that Ben and Poe had somehow managed to bunch themselves up around one side of it so close that they could lean their heads together and say things that Hux could barely hear. It also didn’t help that Hux was dressed considerably smarter than both of them, giving the impression he was wearing some sort of a uniform. Those were the first two injuries to his pride, to put it one way.

The added insult to that injury was when it came out of the woodwork that Poe actually knew Ben’s mother, had interned at her law firm before he’d decided that law wasn’t for him and he wanted to pursue music, something Leia Organa had apparently been unendingly supportive of. What followed was a particularly insular conversation of inside jokes and common experiences, all while Hux sipped at his wine and pushed his food around his plate delicately with his fork. That food cost the same as some people’s weekly rent, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to actually take a bite until after a while it just went cold and he abandoned it to a passing waiter.

By the time dessert rolled around, he was drained. Ben had made a couple of attempts throughout the night to drag him in to the conversation, though they had more often than not been overridden relatively quickly once it was discovered that Poe had an interesting or funny story to tell related to whatever Ben had asked him. On one occasion Ben had asked if Hux remembered the sound technician that almost fell from the rigging on their last tour, only for Poe to let out a belly laugh and jump in with an anecdote about a friend of his who’d almost blown himself up with stage pyrotechnics during a show he’d been opening for. The worst part of it all was that he wasn’t being rude, so much as just…effortlessly charming. His stories were good, he humbled himself at all the right moments to avoid coming off like an egotistic ass, and he listened intently whenever Ben was speaking. To an outsider looking in, it would have seemed like a perfectly pleasant dinner between two new collaborating artists…with a secretary there taking minutes.

“You gonna have something?” Ben asked, rubbing a tear of laughter from the corner of his eye from Poe’s last adventurous story and accepting the dessert menu the waiter passed to him. It had finally gone dark outside, and a server had come round to light the little candles in the centre of each table, bathing the restaurant in a dim, warm glow and a vague smell of jasmine. He flipped the menu over and leaned back in his chair to survey it, legs spread in a blatant disregard for table manners that Leia would probably thump him for, if she were present. Hux had half a mind to kick him under the table, but couldn’t quite muster the energy. 

Poe huffed and rested a hand on his stomach, shaking his head. “I dunno, man, I feel like I’ve eaten my weight already. Should’ve paced myself when they brought out the bread.” He still opened his own menu, propping his elbow on the table as he glanced over the options. “You wanna share something? Don’t think I could handle a whole thing of cheesecake, but a half? More realistic.”

As if someone had given him a nudge with a cattle prod, Hux sat up straight and cleared his throat, removing the napkin from his lap and folding it neatly on to the table. Both Poe and Ben looked up at him as though they’d forgotten he was there, Poe with his eyebrow once again cocked and Ben with an unreadable, possibly-concerned-if-you-squint expression. “Sorry,” Hux said, his voice sounding vaguely distant to his own ears. “I’m not feeling too well, I think I’m going to call it a night.” He rose from his chair and tucked it in behind him, touching his pocket to make sure his phone was there.

“You sure, man?” Poe didn’t sound overly worried, but he kept his eyes trained on him as he made to leave. “You don’t need some water, or something?” If that was meant to be a comment on the amount of wine Hux had drank that night, he didn’t appreciate it. Ben wasn’t saying anything, just thumbing the gilded edge of the menu as he watched Hux ready himself to go.

He shook his head and kept his back straight. “No, thank you. I think I just need to go home. Goodnight.” He turned on his heel and stalked away from the table, forcing himself not to look back over his shoulder at them. He didn’t want to see that they’d already returned to their conversation, or worse, that they were still staring at him to make sure he was really going.

Hux collected his coat from the cloakroom and slipped it on before stepping out into the cool night air, adjusting his collar in the interest of preserving some of his vanity like a band-aid over his wounded pride. The fresh air was really quite pleasant, and if he wasn’t in such a hurry to put some distance between himself and the restaurant he would have liked to spend more time just standing there breathing it in. The hotel had a rooftop bar, the one Ben had mentioned earlier that he remembered being nice, and Hux had no doubt that was where they’d be headed after they’d finished their dessert. But that wasn’t Hux’s concern, and so he forced himself to step to the edge of the sidewalk and raise a hand to hail down one of the taxis that habitually circled the hotel in the evenings.

Just as one pulled up for him and he went to open the back door, he heard someone shouting his name, and glanced up to see Ben jogging out the front door of the hotel. He didn’t have his coat on, which meant he was planning on going back inside after he’d said whatever he needed to say, but Hux still paused and apologised to the taxi driver for the wait as Ben came to a stop in front of them.

“What?” Hux realised he sounded a little harsh, biting the word out at him like an angry dog, but he wasn’t about to apologise for it. 

Ben stuck his hands in the pockets of his dark jeans, looking…bashful? He shrugged one shoulder and glanced up at him through his eyelashes like a scolded child. “Just…checking you’re alright, I suppose. You sure you’re gonna be alright going back by yourself? I can come with you, I’d just need to go get my coat…”

Hux held a hand up to stop him, shaking his head. “I’m fine. I told you earlier, I’m just tired, I didn’t sleep much last night. I need to go and lie down, that’s all.”

Ben didn’t seem too happy with that answer, his lips twisting into a frown, but he didn’t try to protest again. Instead he just stood there for a second scuffing the ground with his shoe, before taking a deep breath and withdrawing something from his pocket. “I was gonna give you this later when Finn came to take us back, uh. But, you’re going, so. Here.”

Hux looked down at the small silver object Ben was extending towards him, the light from his taxi’s headlights glinting off the side of it. He didn’t need to ask what it was - a cigarette case, slim and compact and no doubt insultingly expensive. After a second’s hesitation he reached out to take it, turning it over in his hands. One side was completely smooth, cold to the touch after its exposure to the night air, while the other side was engraved with his initials in swirling cursive. Of course, it would be personalised. He felt almost guilty for assuming it wouldn’t be, as if he’d doubted how much Ben cared.

Hux popped the case open, finding a simple satisfaction in the way it clipped open and shut magnetically without the need for a fiddly clasp. He brought it to his nose and inhaled deeply, peeking at Ben from over the top of the case. Six cigarettes were lined up inside, and though they looked similar in appearance, he knew immediately that three of them weren’t normal. Hux’s nose was refined enough to tell that, and Ben damn well knew it. “Weed? I don’t smoke that, Ben,” he said, lowering the case and snapping it shut again.

Ben snorted. “Yeah, and I’m a virgin.” He reached over and took the case from him, only to step closer and tuck it inside Hux’s jacket pocket. “Just take them,” he said, considerably more gentle. “Please, my treat. Here’s hoping they’ll relax you a little.”

Hux sighed but didn’t move to stop him. In fact, once Ben stepped away from him again, he reached a hand up to cover the case in his pocket, something warm forming within him at the comforting feeling of its weight there. “What’s this in aid of?” he asked.

Again, Ben shrugged and returned his hands to his pockets. “Just…a thank-you. For helping me with the move to Rebel, and…everything else that happened before that. Might not actually, uh…be here, if it wasn’t for you, so. Yeah. Thank you.”

Something in Hux’s chest felt like it broke. He opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, wanting words to come out and getting angry at himself when they failed him. The taxi driver was drumming his fingers with increasing aggression on the steering wheel, and when Hux looked over at him he tapped the meter above the dashboard to indicate he already had it running.

“Looks like you gotta get going,” Ben said, to save Hux having to excuse himself. “I should head back inside, I just left Poe sitting there, kinda rude. They’re gonna think I skipped out on the check, or something.” He gave Hux a lopsided smile and pushed his hair back behind his ears. “I hope you feel better once you’ve slept. I’ll see you tomorrow?”

Hux nodded, still unable to really form a sentence, and he just managed a muttered ‘goodnight’ before Ben raised a hand and jogged off back inside. He let himself into the taxi before the driver could get fed up and leave, buckling himself in and giving his address as if in some sort of trance. He felt guilty, underneath layers of other complex feelings, for behaving like a child whose favourite toy had been taken from them the second Poe got involved. He was a grown adult, he should have known better than to let something so stupid get to him, especially when he wasn’t even quite sure why it had bothered him so much in the first place.

As the taxi pulled away from the hotel and set off in the direction of his apartment, he resolutely tried to promise himself that the next time he saw Poe, he would be civil. They had a tour to prepare for, and then to successfully complete, and after everything Ben had been through he’d be damned if he was the one thing that made this process harder than it needed to be for him. The cigarette case was pressed against his thigh by the seatbelt in his coat pocket, and he went to take it out and turn it over in his hands as he stared blankly out the window.

_Get a grip_, he told himself. _Get a grip and don’t be the one to ruin a good thing._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter three! Finally! Sorry for the wait you guys, I'm currently in grad school doing my MA AND I'm working part-time so my schedule is pretty stuffed but I'm going to try and update more regularly from now on, I'll do my best! <3 Please please please comment and let me know what you think, it really motivates me to write more and write faster and I love hearing your feedback! :D
> 
> I’m also working on a playlist for this fic currently that will act as the album Ben is producing with Rebel Records, just trying to work out which platform will work best for everyone to put it together. In the meantime, this is the current track listing to help you picture what Ben is currently working on/will be performing on tour: 
> 
> 1) The Other Side of Paradise - Glass Animals   
2) The Runner - Foals   
3) Hold On - Paul McDonald   
4) Wake Me Up - Foreign Air   
5) Exits - Foals   
6) Used to the Darkness - Des Rocs   
7) Good Grief - Bastille   
8) Echo - Foreign Air   
9) Polaroids - Paul Conrad   
10) It’s A Trip! - Joywave


	4. San Francisco

The beginning of a tour was always exhausting. Ben had completed two tours already during his career as Kylo Ren; the first a small, US-only run that had lasted two weeks and the second a longer, month-long affair that had taken them across the pond to various places in Europe and as far as Seoul and Tokyo. This third tour, although arranged by a record label with a far smaller budget and far less experience, promised to be the most intense one yet, spanning two months and taking them all over the world after a social media poll had determined where the demand was highest. It had been Rey’s idea, one example of the innovative thinking that had won her the chance to intern at Rebel – as if being related to Ben Solo wasn’t enough. Really, it was a way to make sure Ben wasn’t straining himself unnecessarily; there was no point going all the way to a continent, after all, if nobody there wanted to see him.

But Kylo Ren’s influence was far-reaching, and they’d ended up having to whittle down dozens of suggestions to just twenty-five destinations; eight US states, two stops in the UK, eight European capitals, two stops in South America, three in Asia and two in Australia. It promised to be a long, difficult trip, and Hux had checked in with Ben repeatedly to ask if it would be too much for him to handle, but Ben had dismissed his concerns every time and diverted the conversation elsewhere. He seemed excited, driven, and Hux had to admit that it was good to see him with some light behind his eyes after everything he’d been through in the preceding months. As gruelling as the tour might be, it was a relief to see Ben passionate about his work again, now that First Order wasn’t sucking the life out of it at every turn. Although there was a persistent, nagging feeling that they were making a mistake by embarking on such an ambitious tour so soon after his recovery, he found himself powerless to argue against Ben’s enthusiastic preparations.

The morning of their departure was crisp and cool. It was Hux’s favourite type of autumn day, the sky bright and sunny with an uncharacteristically chilly bite to the air that was unusual in LA and that he missed from England. The large bus they’d hired for the US leg of the tour was parked up outside Ben’s house, and the driver was helping to load suitcases stuffed full of clothes and equipment and merchandise into the luggage hold. It had been decorated specially for them with transfer stickers declaring Kylo Ren’s name in matte silver lettering, with the dates and destinations of the US gigs underneath in a smaller font. It was a nice touch, but it hardly mattered – every single show had sold out within minutes of the tickets going on sale, so there was nothing left to gain by advertising them all over the country. If anything, Hux was a little put off by it, knowing it would only serve to attract paparazzi like a homing beacon the minute they parked up outside any hotel.

Ben emerged from the house with his hair pulled back in a messy bun and a travel cup of coffee dwarfed in his big hand. Hux had knocked for him three times already to get him to drag himself out of bed, and clearly it had been a wrench to do so, as he looked as though he were still half asleep. Once again something foreboding twisted in Hux’s gut at the sight of him, but he shoved it down and forced a smile as Ben loped over to him.

“The Duracell bunny is already on the bus,” he said by way of greeting, gesturing vaguely at the dark tinted windows. Poe had slept over in one of the spare rooms at Ben’s house the night before, as had Hux, to make their departure that morning smoother and faster. He’d surfaced early looking clean-shaven and freshly-showered and passed Hux in the hallway while he was still hammering on Ben’s door, tossing a, “Hey, man!” over his shoulder with more energy than was rightfully appropriate at 6am. Now he’d made his way on to the bus and claimed the bunk closest to the communal area, where he was currently sprawled out reading some sort of beaten paperback.

“Huh?” Ben didn’t look like he’d processed the fact he was outside yet, let alone that Hux had spoken to him. He rubbed some sleep from his eyes and yawned widely, jaw popping.

Hux shook his head. “Never mind. We just have to wait for the last of the stuff to be loaded and then we can be on our way. I’ll let you go back to sleep in your bunk once we’ve quickly gone over the schedule for the rest of the day, and you should probably eat something, too.” He kept his eyes on his tablet while he spoke, because looking at Ben directly somehow felt too…intimate. There was always a sort of atmosphere that clung to the entire process of going on tour, a sense of adventure and the kind of tension that came from being in an enclosed space with each other for an extended period of time. But maybe Hux was just reading too much into it.

Ben snorted. “Alright, mother. Can I get on the bus now? I don’t really wanna watch my cousin making out, you know?”

“What?” Hux frowned, turning on his heel to see Rey standing in the doorway to Ben’s house with her arms looped around Finn’s neck. _Ah_. Rey was going to be staying in the house while they were away to keep the plants watered and hopefully stop paparazzi or fans trying to break in, but Finn would be coming with them, and they would therefore be forced to spend at least a month and a half without each other – there was talk of Rey joining them for the last two stops, if she could find the time. It felt like too private a moment to stand there staring at, but fortunately Rey seemed to sense they were being talked about and broke away from Finn with an audible sigh.

“You’re not getting away that easily.” She ran over and dragged Ben down into a hug with surprising strength, squeezing him in a way that reminded Hux of the way children hugged – completely overcome with the joy of it. When she drew back, she stood on the tips of her toes to bring herself to Ben’s eye-level, looking at him with a sort of mock-sternness. “Behave yourself, okay? Don’t give Hux an aneurism, he’s far too young.”

Ben smirked and ruffled her hair. “I’ll be good as gold. ‘Kay, text me if the house burns down, yeah?” He turned and jogged up into the bus, gripping the handrail as he went. Hux heard him call a greeting to Poe, but turned his attention back to Rey without bothering to listen for Poe’s reply.

He was surprised to see a small crease between Rey’s eyebrows, her eyes still fixed on the bus steps where Ben had just disappeared.

“What?” he asked, tilting his head to try and interrupt her view of the stairs and get her to blink. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing, just…when he spoke just now, his breath…”

“Coffee breath. I’ll be sure to warn Dameron.”

“No, not that, I thought I could smell…” Rey shook her head, though the frown didn’t disappear. “I’m sure it’s nothing…wait, Dameron? You seriously think there’s something there, with the two of them?”

“Very possibly.”

She looked at him as though he’d just told her the sky was red. “…Alright. Look, just…take care of him, okay? Please? I know you will, but…well. You know.”

Hux nodded, reaching out and giving her arm a very light squeeze. Nobody would describe him as an overtly affectionate man, but the gravity of the situation wasn’t lost on him, and he could make one small exception. “I know.”

As the last suitcase was loaded up and the doors to the luggage hold swung down into place, Hux and Finn both climbed on board and Rey went back to the doorway of the house to wave them off. The interior of the bus was pleasant, with black leather couch seats and a small kitchenette area at the back with a microwave and sink. The bunk area was at the rear, and Hux was surprised that he couldn’t hear any chatting from behind the curtain that divided the two spaces. He thought for sure Poe would have charmed Ben into a conversation by now, but evidently not.

Finn settled himself on one of the couches and put on his headphones, closing his eyes and laying back with his head pillowed on one of his arms. There wouldn’t be much for him to do until they reached their first destination and attempted to get off the bus amidst the crowds of paparazzi and fans, so Hux had no issue with him sleeping through the journey they had ahead of them. In fact he envied him – he’d never been able to sleep on buses or planes or trains, and as a result he spent the majority of Ben’s tours fighting off severe jetlag with copious amounts of coffee.

The bus pulled away from the curb and set off down the hill in the direction of the freeway to get them moving out of LA. Hux busied himself answering emails for a little while as he waited for Ben to emerge from the bunk space, but once they’d been driving for about forty-five minutes it soon became evident that he wasn’t going to come out. Frowning, Hux stood up and made his way through the curtain to assess the situation.

Poe had either gone to sleep or just wanted some privacy to read, as he’d pulled the smaller curtain along the length of his bunk shut so Hux couldn’t see in. It was the quietest Hux had ever observed him, something he honestly appreciated but unfortunately couldn’t enjoy properly, as in the next bunk along Ben was sprawled on his front drooling into his pillow with his coffee cup leaking on to the sheets beside him.

Hux cursed softly under his breath, gingerly picking up the cup with his thumb and forefinger and setting it on one of the low tables between the bunks. The sheets were fairly soaked, but it didn’t look like any had got on Ben, so at least he wouldn’t be burnt. “Ben,” he whispered, reaching out to shake him gently. “Ben, wake up.”

The answering groan came out muffled by the pillow, and it took a few seconds for Ben to blink his eyes open. They looked glassy, his pupils shrinking dramatically even against the dim light in the bunk area. “Wass’ goin’ on?” he mumbled, rubbing his face. He sat up without checking above him, and would have thumped his head on the top bunk if Hux hadn’t quickly put his hand in between them and stopped him.

“You fell asleep.” Hux was keeping his voice low, partially out of courtesy to Poe and partially because he didn’t really want their conversation eavesdropped on if he happened to still be awake. That was the problem with tour buses, everyone always knew each other’s business, which wasn’t ideal when one of those people was a relative outsider whose loyalty was still untested. “And spilled coffee on the bed.” It wasn’t too much of an issue; the bus was designed to sleep eight, so Ben could easily shift to another bunk with clean sheets, but it just fed that growing seed of doubt in Hux’s stomach.

Ben frowned and looked down at the puddle of coffee beside him. “Well shit,” he mumbled, sighing and leaning forward with his head in his hands. “Sorry. Sorry, m’just…pretty tired still. I’ll wake up. Gonna need another one of those.” He jabbed blindly at the coffee stain.

Hux chewed his lower lip. “It’s okay. Come on, let’s – you should get out before it gets on you.” He stood to one side to give Ben room to hop down from the bed, which he did, landing slightly unsteadily on his feet. “Why don’t you go sit out on the couch, Finn’s there but he’s napping. I’ll strip this quickly and then come out and join you, we can go over the schedule. Then you can come back and actually get changed into some pyjamas and sleep properly.”

Ben nodded, shuffling through the curtain and out into the communal area. Left alone, Hux sighed and stretched up on his toes to grab the corners of the mattress protector, tugging it off carefully so the little pool of coffee that hadn’t soaked into the sheets yet didn’t splash everywhere. He was about to ball the linens up and toss them into the bin at the back of the bus labelled ‘laundry’, but something made him pause. The bunk area had started to smell strongly of coffee as the aroma saturated the air, but there was an edge to it, something sharper than the usual roasted scent. Hux frowned and tried to concentrate on whatever it was, wondering if perhaps he was just smelling the cleaning products that had been used to prepare the bus for them and getting paranoid over nothing. Determining that that must be the case, he tossed the sheets in the bin and made his way back out to the kitchenette.

One thing Hux was looking forward to on their UK leg of the tour was a cup of tea not made in a microwave. He’d grown accustomed to doing it that way since he’d spent so long in the States – although he’d specially ordered a kettle for his own house and considered it a prized possession – but in general he preferred to use the fancy coffee machines found everywhere and just save tea for when he was at home. There was one on the bus, the kind that required expensive little pods of various brands and flavours to be inserted in order to brew a cup. He made a simple black coffee for himself and added a dash of creamer he found in the mini fridge, then hesitated before beginning one for Ben.

“Ben?”

“Mm?” Ben had got himself seated – upright, thankfully – on one of the couches, and he was flipping through channels on the TV mounted on the wall.

“Did you have syrup or something in that last cup of coffee?" 

“Uh. Yeah, that caramel shit. S’fine if we don’t have it, though, I’ll take whatever.”

Caramel. Maybe that was the smell that was overlaying the generic coffee scent back in the bunk area. Hux tried his best not to dwell on it as he selected a coffee pod and brewed Ben’s cup, bringing both mugs over to the couch to sit down beside him. Ben muttered a ‘thank you’ and cupped his hands around it as if the inside of the bus were freezing, despite the heating being on full blast to the point where Hux actually considered it rather stifling.

“So, schedule?” Ben asked, after a long gulp of coffee. He seemed a little brighter now that he was sitting up and talking, and Hux tried to reassure himself that it was normal for him to be groggy, that a 6am start wasn’t fun for anyone, least of all the person who’d be worked the hardest over the coming two months.

Hux nodded and grabbed his tablet to show him. “Yes, so. From here we’ll be going to San Francisco for our first show tonight, so you’ll only have a little bit of time after the drive to freshen up and eat before we have to head to sound check, so I’d definitely recommend getting back to bed once we’re done here. Sound check starts at four and the gig starts at seven, should end by ten as long as you and Poe both stick to your set lists and we don’t have any first-night technical difficulties. Once it’s over you’re obviously free to do whatever you want but if you want my advice, I’d come back to the hotel and sleep. You have two more San Francisco shows over the next couple of days and a whole day of interviews after that, so. You’ll need your rest.” 

Ben let out a low whistle. “Fun fun fun.” 

“Hey.” Hux locked the tablet and set it aside, turning his body to face Ben more deliberately. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you can say no to all this, or to any part of it. You can stop any time. If it’s too much…”

“Hux. I’m kidding, it’s fine.” When Hux clearly didn’t look convinced, Ben plastered a smile on his face and gave him a nudge with his knee. “It’s fine! You worry way too much, come on. It’ll be fun. We got a fucking awesome album and a great set list and a cool opener, it’ll be good.”

That much, at least, was true. Ben’s first album under Rebel Records had been released the week before, and it was already topping charts worldwide. Every time you turned on the radio there was a 95% chance you’d hear one of the most popular tracks from it, and while the majority of tour tickets had already sold out months ago as soon as the tour was announced and the sale went live, the album kickstarted a veritable bidding war for the few that were remaining, with resale prices online hitting the thousands and growing steadily the closer it got to the dates of the shows. Ben was right – they’d been successful so far, and if that was going to continue, they’d have a good time on tour. If.

“That all, then?” Ben asked, taking another swig of his coffee and looking at Hux expectantly. “For the schedule?”

“Oh. Mhm, yes, that’s it.”

“Nice, then I’m going back to bed. Wake me up if we stop for a smoke break.” Ben grinned and got up, leaving his almost-empty coffee mug behind on the table as he headed back through the curtain into the bunk area.

Hux heard the creak of the ladder indicating that Ben had gone up to one of the top bunks, then silence.

* * *

Once they arrived in San Francisco, Hux didn’t have time to worry about Ben anymore. It was nice, in a way, to have so many distractions coming at him that it was practically impossible for him to get lost in his own head. As predicted, the second they’d stepped off the bus they were surrounded by camera flashes and shouting and screaming, everyone cloying to get a glimpse of Ben. Finn went first, carving a path through the crowd to get them to the door of the hotel, closely followed by Ben and then by Poe and Hux. Ben had changed clothes on the bus about half an hour before they arrived, donning his black jeans and leather jacket and a pair of large sunglasses that blocked out half his face. Poe, meanwhile, swanned through the crowd as though he wasn’t being blinded and grabbed at, grinning at everyone and even pausing to allow a couple of photos on people’s phones, much to Hux’s irritation as he got stuck behind him every single time. 

The rest of the day passed in a blur. There was just enough time to hastily eat some room service that had been brought up – “courtesy of the house”, the waiter had told them – while Ben was having his hair artfully tousled and some light eyeliner applied by a two-person team, and Hux spent that time on the phone to the gig venue making sure everything was ready for their sound check. He only had a few bites of food himself, mostly stealing off other people’s plates as he paced around the room in constant motion.

The sound check went flawlessly save for one faulty cable that was replaced before it could even become an issue, though Hux didn’t like the sick lurch of his stomach at the slightest mention that something had gone wrong. He was too on-edge, too highly strung, and he knew he needed to calm down so his anxious energy didn’t start affecting everyone else around them. The last thing Ben needed was to feel stress radiating off Hux like a space heater.

Fortunately, by the time the doors opened and fans started pouring in, the routine of it all began to soothe Hux considerably. He actually liked the venue Mitaka had picked out – it was relatively small considering it was kicking off the entire tour, and it reminded him of the little shows Ben had played at the beginning of his career before he’d even signed to First Order. Of course, this was still on a much bigger scale than those shows had been, but it had familiar features: the building had once been an old theatre, the standing area was just in front of the stage instead of wrapped around it like at a lot of more modern venues, and the capacity for extravagant pyrotechnics and lighting was practically non-existent, so the very first show of the tour would have a much more old-school feel than the ones that would come after it. It felt traditional, a good place to start, an homage to Ben’s beginnings. 

Hux waited with Ben in the green room while Poe did his opening act, the pair of them silently watching live on the small TV screens where the crowd was responding enthusiastically to anything and everything Poe said. Hux caught Ben’s leg bouncing out of the corner of his eye, and glanced over at him with a raised eyebrow.

“Nervous?”

Ben grinned sheepishly at him and stilled his leg. “Eh. Excited.”

Hux nodded and gave him a little smile, turning his attention back to the TV. On stage, Poe dropped into a bow and held his arms wide to drum up a round of screaming applause, beaming from ear to ear. Whatever Hux’s personal feelings about him, there was absolutely no denying that he was a good performer, and they’d made a good choice to bring him on. He heard the whole spiel of, “_Who’s ready to see Kylo Ren?!_” start up, Poe drawing it out like a pantomime actor and making them shout louder and louder for Ben to come out.

Ben jumped up and took one last look in the mirror to make sure his hair looked right, then gave Hux a thumbs up and jogged out of the green room and up the dark set of stairs that led to the wings stage left. There was silence as Poe walked off, and for a second Hux was staring at a blank TV screen before Ben came in to view and the roar from the crowd became deafening. For a smaller venue it was really packed to capacity, and the fans were really doing the work of a much bigger audience in terms of volume and energy.

Ben had never liked doing his ‘hello’s and introductions at the beginning of his set, preferring to jump straight into the music and save the whole talking routine for a few songs in when he was breathless and could get away with tossing in some curses without it sounding scripted and artificial. And so as soon as he’d got himself into position and got his guitar strap around him, the music began.

He was starting with one of Hux’s favourite songs off the new album, a track with a fantastic bassline and strong vocals that really gave Ben the chance to perform. Because it was a favourite, Hux left the green room and made his way to the side of the stage so he could listen properly while still staying hidden from the audience. It gave him a view of half of the standing area and the seated area above it, and although they were in darkness for the most part there was the occasional moment when one of the stage lights would swing round and illuminate some ecstatic, joyful faces for a split second.

Ben was on top form, his voice clear and powerful and his playing precise. In the moments where he was only required to sing, he’d grab the mic and walk it around the stage, high-fiving his bassist, draping himself around the shoulders of his drummer, only to come back to centre stage and jump right back in with a flawless guitar solo in a way that looked effortless.

He was sweating by the time he came to the final two songs in his set list, and Hux could see the beads of moisture on his arms as he pulled his jacket off and tossed it into the wings on the opposite side of the stage, sparking further screaming from the crowd. There was more to Kylo Ren’s image than just ‘slutty’, but that was still undeniably a big part of it, and Ben knew how to fan those flames when he wanted to. “Everyone having a good time?!” he yelled, and more cheers rang out around the venue. “Awesome! That’s fucking awesome. We’ve only got two more left, but you guys have been incredible. I’m gonna make these ones real good for you, let’s go.”

Hux let his eyes wander as Ben’s guitar was swapped out for him and his band adjusted their instruments, scanning over the few faces he could actually see in the audience. The demographic was to be expected, mostly young people in their very late teens all through to their early thirties, with an even split of men and women.

Which was why it caught his attention when he noticed an older face, a jowly man with a slightly downturned mouth and small, beady eyes lingering in one of the front row seats of the balcony section. He looked like a stereotypical businessman, dressed in a suit complete with a tie and tie pin as far as Hux could see. He supposed that alone wasn’t so strange – after all, Hux himself was also wearing a suit – but he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something…off, about his being there. Quite regularly fans who were underage would drag their parents along to watch the show with them so they were able to get in, but considering the seats at the front of the balcony cost $150 a pop, it was unlikely that was the case. The man also didn’t seem to be interacting with the people either side of him, further confirming Hux’s suspicion that he was there alone, not with a party.

“Okay this next one is ‘_Exits_’, hope you guys like it!” 

Hux briefly looked away from the man in the audience to watch Ben begin his penultimate song, the lights turning to a sultry dark pink colour from their previous plain white. When he looked back again the man was staring down at his phone, leaning back in his chair while the two people either side of him were standing to sway and bop along with the music. It had the effect of hiding him from Hux’s view, which was frustrating, and Hux found himself growing restless as the gig wound to a close and Ben said his ‘goodbye’s and ‘thank you’s.

There was the mandatory leaving of the stage, followed by the mandatory chanting from the audience, followed by the inevitable run back out on to the stage for an encore. It was the bonus track from the album, which had ended up surprising them by being one of the most popular. ‘The Other Side of Paradise’ was also slightly longer than the other songs, and so by the time Ben was well and truly done Hux was even more antsy. He tried to occupy himself by gathering a towel and water bottle for Ben when he came off stage, and seconds later the house lights came up and the entire audience started to head en masse for the exits.

Ben jogged off stage with a bright grin on his face, covered in sweat with his hair plastered to his face. There was a healthy flush in his cheeks and his eyes were lit up, his chest heaving as he accepted the water bottle from Hux and chugged half of it in one gulp. He grabbed the towel with a gasped ‘thank you’ and scrubbed at the back of his neck and shoulders. “Was it good?” he asked, and Hux felt a strange hot flash as the unwelcome thought crossed his mind that it sounded like the kind of thing Ben would ask a partner after sex, breathless and sweaty.

“Mhm.” Hux nodded quickly, taking the now empty water bottle and tossing it in a nearby trashcan. “It was amazing. But I think you know that already.” He smiled then, worried he’d perhaps come across a little too cold. In truth he was incredibly proud of Ben, and delighted to see him actually enjoy himself on stage. Not even halfway through the second tour he’d done with First Order, his exhaustion had been palpable – he’d gone through the motions half-heartedly and even consented to using recorded audio of his guitar playing so he could just focus on singing with the last remnants of his energy. That had been the tour when the budget hadn’t allowed for proper food, and the schedule had been so tight there’d hardly been any time to sleep. It was precisely the thing Hux was aiming to avoid with this current tour, and he was glad that the first show had been a success, to set them off right.

Ben grinned, and Hux’s heart clenched. “Thanks,” he breathed, draping the towel around his shoulders and accepting the enthusiastic hug Poe gave him now that he’d emerged from the green room to congratulate him. 

“You were _awesome_, dude, that whole thing was awesome. I totally see how you could become addicted to that.”

Hux winced at the poor word choice, risking a glance up at Ben. But Ben seemed unphased, nodding along gleefully and mopping at his forehead with the corner of the towel. “Right? It’s a rush, forgot how much I fucking love that. Hey, a couple of the guys from the band are going out tonight – you wanna? Celebrate the first show?” 

Hux tensed, looking up at him cautiously. “Ben…”

“Oh nice, where are they headed? You know I actually lived in San Francisco for like six months, I could show you some cool spots if they haven’t decided yet…” Poe’s eager voice drowned Hux out completely, and a minute later the venue security appeared to start ushering them out and in to the waiting cars. There was a sweet spot leaving any venue on tour where the security would be able to hold back the crowds and make sure they got away safe, but if they waited too long then there’d be time for one or two opportunistic fans to either make their way inside the backstage area or wait out the security who’d eventually let their guard down once the audience thinned out. 

They had to split into separate cars to be transferred back to the hotel, Finn riding up front with Poe while Hux and Ben followed in the car behind. That way Finn would be able to get out first once they arrived and start making room for Ben walk. It also had the added benefit of giving Hux some time to talk to Ben in private, which he tried to do as tactfully as possible.

“Are you sure you want to go out tonight?”

Ben glanced away from the window he’d been staring out of, blinking at him like he was confused by Hux’s concern. “Yeah? Of course, why wouldn’t I?”

Hux frowned. “Because earlier today you fell asleep holding a cup of coffee? Because we were on the road for eight hours, because you’ve been working since four today?” The unspoken extra concern that ‘going out’ meant the temptation of alcohol and god knows what else would be directly in front of Ben was left hanging in the air between them, both of them aware of it but neither willing to say it out loud.

“I’m fine. That was earlier – you know what it’s like, I get this whole adrenaline rush after shows, I’d never be able to sleep if I just tried going to bed now. There’s no point, I might as well go out and work it off so I can actually rest up once I get back.” Ben reached over and squeezed Hux’s knee, giving it a little shake. “C’mon. You saw how well that went, I’m good.” He watched Hux’s face carefully for a minute, then repeated, lower and more sincerely, “I’m good, Hux.” 

It still didn’t feel right. His promise to Rey that he would take care of Ben somehow already felt like it was on the verge of snapping, and the uncomfortable twisting feeling had come back to his stomach again.

“What’s wrong?” Ben sighed, leaning back in his seat and tipping his head back dramatically with a light ‘thud’. “You’re always just…_worrying_ about shit, constantly. Doesn’t it get fucking exhausting after a while?” 

Hux bristled. “If you must know, I thought I recognised someone in your audience tonight. There was this…man in a suit, I don’t know, he looked familiar.”

“_You’re_ a man in a suit.”

“Yes, well done.”

Ben scoffed. “I just mean that it’s not _so_ unusual. It’s probably fine, and you’re probably being paranoid. Scratch that – you definitely are. You should come out tonight, loosen up. You know what San Francisco’s famous for, right…?” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, a grin creeping over his face. 

“Hah! No, thank you. You know that’s not my scene at all. Besides, I have the ones in that cigarette case you gave me. I can sit in the hotel and enjoy a whole night out from the comfort of my room.” Hux stared out of the window, worrying his lower lip between his teeth. “You’ll take Finn with you, right?” It was general policy, since Ben’s presence in town had been widely advertised and hundreds of fans had a vested interest in tracking him down, to have his bodyguard with him at all times. That was the one small comfort Hux had, at least, the one thing stopping the churning in his stomach from becoming unbearable.

“Yeah, ‘course. And Poe. I’ll be fine.” 

The ‘and Poe’ wasn’t quite necessary, as Hux didn’t know anywhere near enough about him to judge whether or not he was a trustworthy person to look after Ben. But he did know Finn, and even regardless of the fact they were paying him to guard Ben, Hux knew that Finn was doing it for Rey’s sake too – keeping her favourite, her _only_, cousin safe. 

While Ben went back to looking out the window, Hux pulled out his phone and opened up his text conversation with Finn, the last few messages all about getting them out of the venue without incident. He drummed his fingers restlessly on his leg for a second, then began to type.

_ (10:30pm) You’re going out with Ben tonight. – AH_

_ (10:30pm) And Poe, I think. – AH_

_ (10:32pm) Out like in San Fran? – F_

_ (10:32) You’re not going, I guess. – F_

_ (10:35pm) You guess correctly. – AH_

_ (10:40pm) …I don’t like it either. – AH_

_ (10:41pm) Can you just keep an eye on him? Tell me if he does anything reckless? – AH_

_ (10:43pm) So I’m spying? – F_

_ (10:44pm) Just tell me if he has anything to drink, okay? And how much. And if he tries to do anything else…stop him before he gets that far. – AH_

_ (10:45pm) So I’m spying. – F_

_ (10:47pm) Yes, fine, if you want to call it that. I’m not proud of it, but it’s better than the alternative. – AH_

_ (10:48) Think they’re going to freshen up at the hotel then go out. I’ll see you tomorrow before sound check. Thank you. – AH_

Finn didn’t need to ask what the alternative was. He’d been there for the worst of what Ben went through, he’d sat outside hospital rooms with a grey-faced, red-eyed Rey and diligently followed Hux and Ben around as they’d toured the rehab facility Ben was eventually checked in to. Maybe Hux was being paranoid, and this would all be fine, but it was impossible to tell.

And this time, he wasn’t going to wait until the worst happened before doing anything to stop it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! Please please please leave a comment and a kudos and let me know what you think, it really drives me to write faster and to write more :D I'd also just like to take a moment to remind people to check the tags and to make sure they're comfortable with the content of this story, as things will start to progress in the next couple of chapters <3


	5. USA to Europe

Hux managed, at most, four hours of fitful sleep that night. He’d paced his room all evening after Ben and Poe had left for the bar with Finn in tow, picking at the food that was brought up to him but largely ignoring it until it went cold and was taken away again. He had Twitter open on his phone, refreshing it continuously with various iterations of Kylo Ren’s name typed into the search bar to see if anyone was talking about him – they were, but mercifully about the concert, not about anything he was currently doing at whatever bar they’d ended up at. The only new things to come from his search were a few blurry photos of Ben and Poe walking down the street somewhere out in the city, Ben raising his hand in a wave towards the camera and Poe giving whoever was taking the photo a thumbs-up. Nothing untoward.

Eventually he’d fallen asleep sitting upright on the sofa with a full cup of tea cooling in front of him at around one in the morning, only to wake up again at four when he heard vague movements in the hallway of the suite. For a moment he thought Ben and Poe might come in, turn the light on and see him blearily getting to his feet, but after a couple of seconds of hushed laughter and the ‘thump’ of shoes being kicked off and hitting the wooden floor, he heard two quiet “g’night”s before two doors closed on either side of the hall. Another second passed, where Hux swore he heard a heavy sigh and a yawn, then another door further down the corridor closed much more quietly.

Too tired to overthink it, and satisfied in the knowledge that all three of them had made it back, Hux got up and went to go put himself to bed to savour the last couple of hours he had before the morning. As he stripped off his suit and threw on a white t-shirt from the top of his open suitcase, the room was steadily beginning to lighten. As he lay down, he could just see the sun start to come up behind the next building over.

The next time he woke, Hux could hear movement out in the main living area of the suite, though it wasn’t the clunky sounds of hungover men stumbling over one another. Instead it was the very gentle ‘clang’ of cutlery against china, accompanied by the smell of breakfast permeating throughout the set of rooms. Hux waited until he heard the room service waiter leave the suite before getting up to dress himself, yawning through his morning routine of washing his face and putting in his contact lenses. It wasn’t the first time he’d navigated a day on hardly any sleep, and he knew he just needed to seek out coffee as soon as possible and he’d be just fine again.

Venturing out into the living room, he discovered he wasn’t the first person awake. Although he looked tired, Finn was sat on the sofa with a mug of coffee in his hand and his phone wedged between his cheek and shoulder as he stirred in milk from a little silver jug on the tray in front of him. It seemed as though he’d prepared himself his own meal from the bigger selection that had been brought in, and a quick glance around the room confirmed that the majority of the food was over on the main dining table. Not wanting to seem as though he was eavesdropping, Hux went over to start assembling a plate for himself, picking out a grapefruit that had been helpfully sliced in half and grabbing a spoon to eat it with before moving on to his coffee.

“Uh-huh. Oh, you saw those too, huh?” Finn finished up making his drink and took a sip, leaning back against the sofa with a groan that made him sound old beyond his years. “Yeah, I know. It’s fine, though, wasn’t anything wild. You’re having more fun there, I promise. And hey, congrats on that grade, I told you you’d kill it.” He grinned, chewing his lower lip. “Yeah. Yeah, of course, soon as I get back. Or when you come out here, whatever – we’ll figure it out. Mhm. Alright, well, I gotta go, Hux just woke up. Yeah, I’ll tell him. Bye, babe. Bye.”

Hux sat down on the sofa opposite and raised his eyebrow, lips quirking. “Rey?”

Finn flushed slightly and hid his face by taking another long drink of coffee. “Uh, yeah. Just calling to check up, she said she saw some photos on Twitter last night and kinda got freaked out. Told her there’s nothing to worry about. She’s doing good, got this awesome grade on a mixing project she handed in ages ago – oh, and she says hi.”

Hux nodded along, taking a small bite of grapefruit. “And? Did you mean it?”

“Mean what?”

“That there’s nothing to worry about. Last night, I mean…was he…?”

Finn held his hands up, palms forward. “Good as gold,” he said. “Didn’t do anything you said he shouldn’t. Followed him and Poe all night.”

Hux raised his eyebrow, slowly chewing and swallowing his bite. “You’re sure? He didn’t take anything, didn’t drink anything?”

“Nothing except soda. Trust me, I watched the bartender make everything he had, it was just plain soft stuff. Hell, he switched to water by the end of the night. I promise, nothing happened, I’d tell you if it did.”

Letting that sink in for a minute, Hux nodded slowly. “Yes,” he said eventually, digging his spoon back into the grapefruit. “Yes, I know. Thank you, Finn. I’m sure you’ll want some time to rest now, but I know you can understand why I wanted you to go with him.”

Finn nodded. “Yeah, ‘course. I get it.”

Both of them fell silent as one of the doors in the hall swung open and shuffling footsteps advanced towards the living room. Ben looked rather worse for wear, for a man who supposedly hadn’t been drinking the night before. His hair was a bird’s nest around his face and his shoulders were hunched as he dragged his bare feet like a caveman across the floor, and when he yawned on his way past the sofas Hux could hear his jaw pop. He was wearing dark grey sweatpants that were slung low on his hips, and a white tank top that hid practically none of his chest. “Morning,” he mumbled, without looking at either of them. “Smells good in here.”

“There’s breakfast on the table,” Hux told him, keeping a wary eye on him even as he reached for the newspaper that had been left on the coffee table by the waiter. “I suggest filling up, I doubt we’ll have much time for lunch later.” It was a lie, of course he’d make sure Ben got adequate time to eat as much as he needed to, but suggesting he wouldn’t was a good way to ensure Ben was sensible about eating now.

Not that he needed encouragement. Ben was already helping himself to a large pile of hot buttered toast and two fried eggs, adding some bacon on the side as an afterthought. Once his heaped plate was groaning under the weight of its contents he came and flopped down beside Hux, immediately digging in.

“So. I trust you had a good time last night?” Hux was doing his very, very best to keep his voice neutral, flipping idly through the pages of the newspaper as though he were suddenly very interested in the sports columns. Hux had never been interested in sports in his life.

Ben grinned around a mouthful of food, shoving some hair out of his face. “Uh-huh. Think Poe had a better night than I did, though, if you know what I mean.” He winked at Hux and shoved another piece of toast into his mouth. “Wouldn’t go knocking on his door just yet.”

Hux’s eyes widened a fraction, and he looked to Finn for some guidance, who just nodded miserably and went back to staring at his phone. “Well then,” he said, unable to keep the note of surprise from his voice. “That’s…good, for him. That he’s…enjoying himself.” It wasn’t the fact that Poe had picked someone up that shocked him – it was rather obvious that he was attractive and charming and he could likely have anyone in the place that he wanted – but instead it was Ben’s casual, celebratory reaction towards it. Hux had been operating firmly under the assumption that there was something going on between the pair of them, only now a seed of doubt had been planted. “I didn’t hear anyone come in with you, though.” The words slipped out before he could stop them, and he winced, taking a bite of his grapefruit to occupy himself so he wouldn’t say any more.

Ben slowed his chewing, raising an eyebrow at him. “You were waiting up for us to come home?”

“I. Well. Perhaps.” Hux coughed, setting aside his plate despite there being a whole half of the fruit still left untouched. “Not intentionally. I was…answering emails out here, and I fell asleep on the sofa. You woke me up when you came in.”

Ben sucked in air through his teeth. “Ah. Yeah, sorry about that, we were trying to be quiet. That’s why you didn’t hear him, we told him to be real quiet in case you were sleeping.” He reached over and gave Hux’s knee an apologetic squeeze, then went back to eating his food as though nothing had happened. As though Hux wasn’t suddenly flustered for a reason he couldn’t fathom.

“It’s alright. I had a lot of work to get done, I needed to be up. Speaking of which, we should go over the schedule for the next few days, since we’ll be in San Francisco now until Friday. It’s all very repetitive, shouldn’t be too difficult to grasp, then after that we’ll be moving on to Nevada…”

It was only when Ben nudged up closer to him to share his tablet that Hux got a good look at him for the first time. It was only then that he saw just how bloodshot his eyes were, just how large his pupils in spite of the bright morning light pouring into the room.

* * *

There were no more nights out for the remainder of the US leg of the tour. It wasn’t a specific ban on Hux’s part, but he would be lying if he said he hadn’t engineered the schedule and tweaked their plans to make it very difficult for Ben to get anywhere near a bar. Suddenly all their flights were red-eyes, or they’d be on the road non-stop all night so when they arrived at their destination in the morning they had to sleep with the blackout curtains drawn with the safe knowledge that no clubs or bars were open anywhere in the city. He was meticulously careful that it didn’t compromise Ben’s rest or wellbeing, that there were always eight hours allotted for sleeping regardless of when those hours fit in, but he was militant about keeping both him and Poe away from night life in every single location they visited.

Hux had decided against confronting Ben about that night. He didn’t put the blame on Finn – though it had taken him a while to arrive at that decision – because he remembered full well from the last time things turned bad that it was near impossible to stop someone who was determined enough, if you even caught them doing it in the first place. He was still partially holding out hope that he was overreacting, that nothing had happened; bloodshot eyes could mean anything, could easily be a result of a day of travelling and work and a night out on top of that. He wouldn’t even really care if he’d been smoking weed, so long as that was all it was. The dilated pupils were far harder to explain away, but Hux knew he was in denial and he wasn’t quite ready to come out of it yet.

Some locations were harder to police than others. Their one-night stop in Vegas had been a nightmare, and Hux had spent the entire evening feeling like he was in some sort of cheesy movie, trying to stop the sinful temptations of the city sink their claws into Ben the virtuous, vulnerable innocent. The idea of it had made him laugh a little, despite the clammy feeling creeping all over him. In the end he’d resorted to shepherding Ben off stage after his set and directly onto the tour bus with the excuse that there was a change of plans and they’d now be driving a little longer and staying in the next destination for an extra night because of ‘hotel availability reasons’. It was a piss-poor excuse, but one that Ben and Poe seemed to accept without much fuss in their semi-exhaustion after the concert.

The shows continued to be flawless. Poe was on top form for every single one, his high energy and charisma seemingly constant despite the long hours and all the travelling. His set always bled seamlessly into Kylo’s, and the crowd went as wild for Kylo as they always had, more receptive to his new work at Rebel than they ever were to what he produced with First Order.

By the end of the first two weeks of the tour, marking the final shows in the US, it was clear that it had already been a roaring success. Reviews were pouring in on a nightly basis, featurettes in Rolling Stone and Billboard went viral, and they sold out and restocked the online merch store five times. The atmosphere was good, was positive. Despite Hux’s worst fears and concerns, Ben seemed happy – he seemed to be thriving off the attention and the amazing reception of his work, exhibiting none of the stress he’d shown on his last tour with First Order. It wasn’t uncommon at all for Hux to find him composing new music for fun in between shows, grinning and laughing with Poe and Finn, and on one occasion FaceTiming Rey to show her some crystal necklace he’d picked up in one of the towns in New England they’d visited.

The concerns didn’t go away, not at all. But as they neared the end of the US leg and prepared to jump to Europe for their next few shows, Hux felt safe to take his foot off the pedal, just slightly. He left the job of watching Ben more to Finn, no longer feeling the need to hover constantly himself. He stopped tampering with their schedule, trusted Ben to make the right decisions of where to go after shows, and for the most part was pleased to find that he generally just decided to go back to the hotel and sleep. The adrenaline and rush of that first gig in San Francisco had evidently worn off a little, and now rest was a priority, something Hux was glad about.

Their last show was in New York, the biggest crowd they’d played for on the entire tour so far. The atmosphere was incredible, and Hux had stood directly in the wings to watch from the side of the stage as the bright lights flooded first Poe and then Ben with a bright glow, highlighting them for the deafening screams of the audience. New York was also the only other show, besides the first in San Francisco, where Hux swore he saw someone out of place among the crowds. This time it was a man in an expensive-looking business suit, lingering at the back of a group of reporters out the back of the venue as Ben was being transferred from the building to the car headed for the airport. He had no camera and wasn’t yelling out any questions, just standing and watching the chaos with an aura of calm that didn’t belong there at all. Hux didn’t have time to dwell on it as they rushed to make their flight to London, but it weighed heavily on his mind during the entire seven hour journey beyond that.

* * *

If Ben had been on top form in the States, his efforts doubled once they arrived in Europe. Hux suspected it was because his American audience was something of a given, a sure thing; it was where he’d always had most of his popularity, where his largest fanbase was concentrated. Being in Europe gave him something to prove, although really he needn’t have worried – the crowds in London, Paris, Berlin, Barcelona, Athens, Prague and Warsaw had gone wild for him, especially when he’d rolled out the carefully-rehearsed “hello”s and “thank you”s in each different language at the beginning and end of his sets. They also liked specific things he did more than any American audience Hux had ever seen – in London and Berlin, for example, the arenas had erupted in gleeful shouting and applause every time the word ‘fuck’ left Ben’s mouth through the mic.

The first few stops also passed largely without incident. Hux tightened the reins a little more in some places, especially in the locations where they were stopped for multiple nights and there as a risk of Ben getting bored and wanting to venture out to see the nightlife. Poe didn’t seem too bothered by all the control measures; although he had no way of knowing the severity of what had happened to Ben before, he seemed to sense that it was a sensitive topic that needed careful treading, and Hux respected him for that at least. In fact, quite often Poe was instrumental in staving off boredom by suggesting other things they could do in place of a full night out, some of his creative solutions including looking around Christmas markets – which, in Hux’s opinion, were out far too early considering it was the middle of October – and scouting out vintage music stores in each city for new instruments. Hux honestly appreciated it; he’d happily go through the effort of filing the paperwork to ship Ben’s new purchases back to the States if it meant he wasn’t sitting in an emergency room while Ben got his stomach pumped. Hell, he’d personally put them in a sailboat and take them back to LA himself if it meant he never had to endure that particular experience again.

It perhaps made sense, then, that Hux was lulled into a false sense of security by how smoothly everything had been going. It made sense that when something bad did happen, he wasn’t entirely prepared.

Their final stop on the European leg of the tour was Rome, where Ben had been scheduled to perform two shows and give one interview to an international magazine based in Italy. The two shows had gone off without a hitch, and Ben had consented to going straight back to the hotel once again to sleep. To sleep, he’d said. To sleep.

In hindsight, Hux should have seen it coming. Should have thought harder about why Ben seemed so cheerful about the prospect of an early night, after the high of a show done well. He should have looked harder at the suite, spotted the mini-bar in the corner that was stocked every single day by the waiter with complete discretion, no bill left, everything just added to the final total at the end of the stay. That would be charged straight to Rebel, with Hux never seeing the figures or charges for himself. He should have realised that the housekeeper would come in the early morning before anyone woke up and refill whatever was missing.

None of that hit him until the following day, when he was on the set of Ben’s interview. Poe had been given the day off to go and explore the city since the interviewer wasn’t interested in getting any quotes from him, something he’d taken in stride and hadn’t been offended by. Hux got the impression that he was enjoying himself enough that he didn’t need any of the bells and whistles that Ben was getting – none of the interviews or featurettes or photoshoots. It left just Ben, Hux and Finn in the room with the journalist and her cameramen, the latter perched in folding canvas chairs with cups of coffee while Ben got some minor touch-up makeup in front of the lights.

“Rey mentioned she might come out to see us once we hit Australia,” Finn was saying, scrolling through her last messages on his phone. “It’s a long flight but she’s wanted to go for ages. I figured maybe because it’s the last leg, I could stay out there for a bit with her once you and Ben go back to LA? Maybe. We can talk about…Hux?”

“Mm?” Hux made a noncommittal noise, completely distracted. There was a small crease between his eyebrows as he watched the scene across the room, the makeup artist fussing over the dark circles under Ben’s eyes. They were quite a stark contrast to the pink flush in his cheeks, the whole effect making him look almost ill under the glare of the lights.

Finn frowned, following his gaze to the set as the makeup artists moved away and the journalist came and took her seat opposite Ben. “Just…talking about Rey. Everything okay, man?”

Hux chewed his lower lip and fidgeted with the coffee cup in his hands. “I don’t…know,” he said slowly, falling silent as there was a call for quiet and the cameras started rolling. Ben had been abnormally quiet in the ride to the interview venue that morning, staring resolutely out of the window with his hands balled into fists in his lap. He’d almost looked like he was trying not to be sick, and now Hux thought back to it, he’d barely touched anything from the breakfast selection that morning. He’d gulped down an entire bottle of water, but very little else.

“So, Kylo Ren. You’re coming to us at the tail end of a hugely successful European tour – every single venue sold out, it’s been streamed all around the world…how does that feel?” As far as opening questions went, it was very standard and uninspiring. But it was safe ground, safely within the parameters of the pre-approved list Hux had sent ahead, and so it was just fine.

What wasn’t so normal, however, was Ben’s response. It seemed to take him a second to really comprehend what the journalist had said, blinking slowly and then giving her a single nod. “It feels…” he began, sort of rolling his head on his shoulders a little. “Fucking amazing, to be honest.”

Hux winced. He knew the crowds went wild for that sort of language on stage, in the heat and atmosphere of the moment, but it sounded too crass and too harsh in the otherwise silent interview room. Even the journalist seemed slightly surprised by it, though not unpleasantly so – in fact, Hux saw a brief flash in her eyes even from across the room, like someone who’d struck gold. That alone was enough to make him squirm in his seat, already dreading what might be coming next.

“Well, that’s great,” the journalist continued, flipping to another page in her notebook. “I’d like to talk about your new album, of course, your first under new management over at Rebel Records – congratulations, by the way – but first I’d like to briefly ask you about the pressure of undertaking a tour like this. Could you talk a little bit about that?”

Hux’s hands twisted in his lap, and he leaned down to abandon the coffee cup beside his chair to reduce the risk of it spilling everywhere as his nerves increased. It still wasn’t off-script, but it was veering a little too close to it for Hux’s liking.

Ben snorted, offering a lopsided, sleepy grin. “Nah,” he drawled, and for a second it seemed as though he were going to leave it at that before he jolted into a better sitting position like someone had ran an electric current through him. “I mean! I was raised around this, y’know? S’not like it’s fucking…all new to me, or anything, it’s old.”

Hux felt colour start to drain from his face. That definitely wasn’t a topic that needed bringing up, and yet the interviewer latched on to it, determined.

“Oh, yes of course, your father. Everyone knows Han Solo was a true icon, and I…”

“Sorry.” Hux didn’t even realise he was getting up out of his chair until his feet were already carrying him across the room, stepping in the way of the cameras to interrupt their shot of Ben. He didn’t need anyone pausing the footage and micro-analysing every tiny shift in his facial expression after that. “Sorry. That definitely wasn’t on the list, we’d all much prefer it if you could stick to the questions we’ve approved, thank you.” He was using his ‘no-nonsense business’ voice, as Ben liked to teasingly call it, keeping his posture straight and chin lifted in the hopes that he’d exude enough of an air of authority that the interviewer would listen to him.

“Of course, Mr Hux, my apologies.” The journalist waited for him to sit down again before clearing her throat and taking a sip of the water on the table beside her chair. “Alright, let’s move on to the music, shall we? It’s why we’re all here, after all. You’ve said previously that you were influenced by themes of freedom and liberation while writing this album, can you explain a little more about that…?”

There. Back on track. It was becoming rapidly clear to Hux that something wasn’t right with Ben, that he’d done something to himself and, regardless of what it was, it was extremely important for it to be contained. They’d done a masterful job the last time this happened of covering up the severity of Ben’s situation, successfully keeping his stint in rehab out of the press under the guise of him going away for a private ‘writing retreat’ to stimulate his creativity; the appearance of a new album shortly after his return had helped solidify that lie, and nobody had questioned it yet. But if it happened again, it would be much harder to cover up.

For a while the answers ran normally. Ben talked about the album, his inspiration, his writing methods, all sorts of generic things that he’d already repeated dozens of times over on the tour and would likely be sick of saying soon if he wasn’t already. His voice was still slow, still slightly slurred, but he still made it through each question without any real incident.

It was about twenty minutes in that it happened. The journalist had asked something inane about what tour bus life was like, that Hux had resisted the urge to roll his eyes at. He was already tensed up in mild despair at Ben’s answer of, “Not as much fun now groupies aren’t really a thing”, but the events of the next couple of seconds had him up out of his chair again and across the floor once more.

From the pocket of his leather jacket Ben had produced a large, flat silver flask. An old-fashioned style, Hux immediately recognised it as the one that had belonged to Han before he died, now filled with something that smelled incredibly alcoholic. And sure enough, when Ben lifted it to his lips to take a drink in full view of the multiple cameras and several eye witnesses, his uncoordinated hand slipped and made the flask miss his mouth and dribble what was likely hotel mini-bar whiskey down the front of his t-shirt. He didn’t even really react, besides a soft snort of amusement and him pawing at the damp patch it had created. 

“Okay.” Hux stepped in front of the cameras again and this time spread his arms out to ensure he blocked every single lens he possibly could. “That’s it. I’m afraid this interview is over, I apologise for your wasted time. Please, don’t go anywhere, I have nondisclosure agreements for everyone here and I do intend on making every single person in this room sign one. I’d also like you to hand over that footage and delete any and all copies from your records. Understood?”

While Finn ran over to deal with the disgruntled journalist and her frustrated cameramen, his face drawn and his eyes anxiously darting over to Ben every five seconds, Hux turned his full attention to Ben and snatched the flask out of his hand. “I knew it. I knew it, Ben, oh my god…_I knew it_.”

Ben at least had the decency to look chastised. “M’sorry,” he mumbled. “Hux, m’sorry, I don’t…”

“Save it.” Hux rubbed a hand over his face and took out his phone, stomach twisting itself into knots as he brought up Rey’s contact and started reluctantly typing out a message to her. He didn’t want to worry her, but she had a right to know what was going on with her own cousin. “Is this all?” he was asking as he typed, waving the flask in one hand to indicate what he meant. “Is this all you’ve been doing, drinking? Nothing else?”

Ben said nothing. The silence was an answer in itself, signed sealed and delivered when Ben averted his eyes and flushed to the tips of his ears with shame.

“Fuck. _Fuck!_” Hux shoved the flask into his own back pocket so there’d be no easy way of Ben getting it back, changing from a text to a call and holding the phone to his ear so he could listen to the dial tone as it connected. “I knew it, I knew this was too much too soon, God, this is my fault…”

“What’re you gonna do?” Ben sounded like a little child awaiting punishment for breaking a rule, wondering if his parents would confiscate his toys or ground him or not let him play on the computer for a week. He sounded meek, pitiful. Like he knew he’d royally screwed up.

Hux sighed, running a hand through his hair and ignoring the waxy feeling of his hair product on his fingers. “I don’t know, Ben,” he admitted, shrugging his arms in disbelief. “I just don’t. I don’t know how you even…” He shook his head, resting his head in his hands where he’d sank back down into the canvas chair. “You can’t carry on like this, simple as that. So if you really can’t stop…we’re going to have to abandon the tour.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoo! It's been a whole month (exactly!) since I last uploaded a chapter, so sorry about the wait! Full time grad school and working 25 hours a week will kick your ass and rob you of your free time, I swear. 
> 
> Anyway, I hope everyone liked this one! Things are heating up. A couple of things, now might be a good time to refer back to the content warnings in the tags and the notes in the prologue, as things will get a bit darker in the next chapter (not by a ton, just slightly, but I still want people to look after themselves). Also, if you happen to notice any spelling or grammar errors in this then it's because I was writing at 1am, and I'll go back and find and fix them as soon as I have time, I promise! 
> 
> Thank you all for your lovely comments and kudos so far, please keep both of them coming as they help motivate me to write much more and much faster! <3


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